A SPHERE BOOKA SPHERE BOOK
First published in the USA by Daw Books Inc. 1988 First published in Great 
Britain by Sphere Books Limited 1990
Copyright © Marion Zimmer Bradley 1985
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or 
transmitted, in any
form or by any means without the prior
permission in writing of the publisher, nor be
otherwise circulated in any form of binding or
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without a similar condition including this
condition being imposed on the subsequent
purchaser.
Reproduced, printed and bound in Great Britain by Cox & Wyman Ltd, Reading.
ISBN 0 7474 0465 8
 
 
 
 
Contents
Introduction  .................................ix
Centaurus Changeling........................15
The Climbing Wave  ..........................67
Exiles of Tomorrow.........................141
Death Between the Stars .....................149
Bird of Prey ................................169
The Wind People...........................205
The Wild One  ..............................225
Treason of the Blood........................243
The Day of the Butterflies   ...................259
Hero's Moon  ...............................273
The Engine.................................299
The Secret of the Blue Star...................307
To Keep the Oath...........................329
Elbow Room  ...............................359
Blood Will Tell  .............................379
 
 
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The Best of Marion Zimmer Bradley
 
 
Introduction
 
I've told the story before; how, on a train journey from Watertown, New York, 
back to my family home in Rensselaer County, I changed trains in Utica, and, 
almost for the first time in my life, bought myself a box of chocolates and a 
magazine of my own free choice. It was literally the first time in my life that 
I had been in a newsstand with money from my summer job in my pocket; and I 
happened to have memory of reading a couple of issues of Weird Tales which I'd 
found in our attic before my mother, troubled by the lurid covers and the fear 
I'd have nightmares, took them away from me. I had intended to buy myself a copy 
of Weird Tales; but they didn't seem to have that magazine, so I looked around 
and bought myself a copy of Startling Stories containing the Kuttner novel THE 
DARK WORLD, which I later knew to have been written by Catherine Moore Kuttner 
instead.
Looking back over a long, not uneventful life, I can honestly say that no 
experience in my life has ever given me the same excited delight as riding 
through the twilight, reading Kuttner's wonderful mythic novel of a man who 
changed worlds. Perhaps it could compare only with the fascination of my first 
LSD trip, or the time I first walked through the British Museum of which I had 
read so much, or my first Turandot at Lincoln Center, or standing high atop the 
shrine at Delphi and looking down at the old Sacred Way. To this day, I can 
remember the shock of delight reading Tennyson's poem Tithonus where I 
discovered the quote which must have been used for the title: "A soft wind blows 
the mists away: I feel A breath from that dark world where I was born."
When I finished the Kuttner novel, I read a couple of the short stories - I 
remember Jack Vance's "Planet of the Black Dust" - and then turned to the "fan 
letter columns" in the back. Shock of thrills: there were other people who loved 
this kind of story and were willing to talk about them, and even published 
fanzines to write about them.
By the time my journey was finished, I knew not only that I wanted to be a 
writer but that I wanted to write science fiction. Later that summer I typed a 
first draft of the novel I had written the year before, which ten years later 
was to see print under the name THE SWORD OF ALDQNES, and submitted it to 
Startling Stories: it was kindly rejected by Sam Merwin, the editor at that 
time. Later, Leo Margulies, the editor of Startling and its sister magazine 
Thrilling Wonder, bought several of my short stories. At that time I also began 
writing to magazines and to fanzines, and that fall I started fan activity. 
After a desperately lonely childhood as a bookworm among kids interested only in 
throwing various shapes and sizes of balls, or dressing up in short skirts and 
jumping around yelling "Yay, yay, yay" about the ball-throwers (an activity 
which is still, I consider, the only activity sillier than throwing the balls 
themselves), I discovered congenial people, who would and could talk to me as if 
I were a person, not a little girl.
Three years later, still an active fan, I married (it was, and in some areas 
still is the only way for a young woman to get away from a bad home situation) 
and during fourteen years in Texas in small and smaller towns, following the 
fortunes of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad for which my first 
husband worked as an Agent-telegrapher, I substituted fan activity for the 
football -and-church centered life of Texas. To this day the mail is the high 
point of the day, and an empty mailbox will make me sulk or fall into a 
depression. I published fanzines, wrote volumi­nously for them, wrote reams of 
letters (I still do), and tried to write for the pulp magazines I still 
passionately loved. (I couldn't afford to buy books, and it never would have 
occurred to me then to try writing them. That came later, with my first novel, 
SEVEN FROM THE STARS. "Falcons of Narabedla," and "Bird of Prey," which later 
became novels, were novelette length Kuttner pastiches; not because I was 
deliberately imitating but because I wanted to write stories like the ones I 
read in the magazines.
Nevertheless my first long published novelette was not a pastiche, but my first 
really original work; in this day of embryo transfers and test tube babies it 
seems almost prophetic. "Centaurus Changeling" reflected my love of reading 
medical books. "The Wind People" was, I think, a dream I had in Texas. Most of 
those early Texas stories were reflecting a drab daily life cooking and washing 
diapers and cleaning our small rented houses; and an extremely lively interior 
life based on the books I read and the people I knew only through fanzines. Big 
events in my life were a sandwich at the local hamburger cafe (a night out); 
there was nothing else to do except go to church or listen to football games, 
and I have kept a perfect record: I have never yet attended a football game. I 
was, on the other hand, a vigorous listener to the Metropolitan Opera radio 
broadcasts, and my first use of money, when I began having it, was to buy season 
tickets to the San Francisco Opera; my biggest indulgence now is for telecast 
video tapes and laser disc performances of real operas.
Well, a day came when I sold my first long novelette: "Bird of Prey," later to 
be DOOR THROUGH SPACE, a novel about the Dry Towns which would surface later in 
the Darkover novels. Then I began writing about Darkover. About the time I was 
beginning to write science fiction again after a long hiatus writing 
pseudonymous novels for a trashy publisher called Monarch Books, I left Texas 
and my first husband. I have nothing bad to say about my first marriage: the 
enforced loneliness threw me on my own resources and gave me leisure to write. 
Brad thought I spent too much money on paper and postage, but if I was willing, 
as he put it, to have these things instead of fashionable clothes and 
possessions, it was OK with him; he was not ambitious. Also, if I was willing to 
live modestly on his salary instead of getting a job (I preferred not to raise 
our son in the care of someone whose market worth was even less than mine - 
i.e., leave him in the care of an uneducated woman who would otherwise be doing 
unskilled labor) he allowed me to do so. Even­tually, the Monarch romances paid 
my tuition to a local small college - ostensibly so I could get a teach­ing 
certificate and support the family after Brad re­tired from the railroad. 
Instead I left Texas, moved to Berkeley, and married again; had two younger 
chil­dren by my second marriage, and once again discovered that writing was a 
way to stay home with my kids while working. This is why I have never believed 
the story that domesticity damages a woman's intellectual life; while the kids 
were small I wrote a few books every year.
Not easily. I remember training the kids that Mommy was never to be interrupted 
at the typewriter, and I bribed them shamelessly for letting me alone - they 
call it positive reinforcement, now.
But I had to learn to be sociable. I remember being afraid that with 
intellectual stimulation, libraries, music, free concerts and a loving husband 
who wished for my company instead of using me as a housekeeper, cook, laundress, 
I would lose the impulse to write. I still prefer to keep people at arm's length 
so that I can find the best company in the world; the characters who come out of 
my brain and mind.
Becoming an editor - when I had money enough, I published a fiction fanzine - 
helped me at long last to write more than the occasional short story. I never 
felt much at ease writing short stories: my "natural" feeling is to write 
novels, the longer the better. I learned painfully during the "Monarch years" to 
write novels to severe plot and deadline requirements, to cut my work to the 
bone: but only when I was freed of these length requirements by Don Wollheim's 
willingness to experiment with long novels like THE HERITAGE OF HASTUR (1975) 
did I really begin to write naturally.
Over a forty year writing career I have written forty odd novels (some of them, 
as I like to say, very odd indeed) and considerably fewer short stories, the 
great majority of them being impulses - I would wake up with an idea, juggle the 
plot a bit, and sit down and write it on a sustained impulse, not stopping till 
I finished it. Since I usually write novels "on contract," the short stories 
were seldom profitable. I write a short story only if I can't figure out a way 
to make the idea into a novel, or want to write a little known episode in the 
life of a character from one of my novels. "To Keep the Oath" is such a story; I 
was curious as to how Camilla met Kindra. Both characters were in THE SHATTERED 
CHAIN (1976).
I don't imitate Kuttner any more, or even Leigh Brackett. My current 
enthusiasms, besides opera, are Gay Rights and Women's Rights - I think Women's 
Liberation is the great event of the twentieth century, not Space Exploration. 
One is a great change in human consciousness; the latter is only predictable 
technology and I am bored by technology.
I write on a word processor, but prefer my typewriter. And I am still a fan at 
heart - because I am still looking for any reading matter which will arouse in 
me the old thrill of those early pulp magazines. FOR BETTER OR WORSE, A WRITER 
IS WHAT I AM, and I no longer bother to explain or excuse it. I prefer science 
fiction to any other reading or writing, and to people who ask why I don't read 
mainstream (or write it), I say I cannot imagine that the content of the 
mainstream  spy novels, corruption in the streets, adultery in the suburbs can 
possibly compete with a fiction whose sole raison d'etre is to think about the 
future of the human race.
 
Centaurus Changeling
 
". . . the only exception to the aforesaid policy was made in the case of 
Megaera (Theta Centaurus IV) which was given full Dominion status as an 
indepen­dent planetary government; a departure almost without precedent in the 
history of the Terran Empire. There are many explanations for this variation 
from the usual practice, the most generally accepted being that which states 
that Megaera had been colonized from Terra only a few years before the outbreak 
of the Rigel-Procyon war, which knocked out communications in the entire 
Centaurus sector of die Galaxy and forced the abandon­ment of all the so-called 
Darkovan League colonies, including Megaera, Darkover, Samarra and Vialles. 
During these Lost Years, as they were called, a period embracing, in all, nearly 
600 years  ... the factors of natural selection, and the phenomenon of genetic 
drift and survival mutation observed among isolated popula­tions, permitted 
these 'lost1 colonies to develop along scientific and social lines which made 
their reclamation by the Terran Empire an imperative political neces­sity. ..."
From J. T. Bannerton: A Comprehensive History of Galactic Politics, Tape IX.
The Official Residence of the Terran Legate on Megaera was not equipped with a 
roofpost for land­ing the small, helicopter-like carioles. This oversight, a 
gesture of bureaucratic economy from the desk of some supervisor back on Terra, 
meant that whenever the Legate or his wife left the Residence, they must climb 
down four flights of stairs to the level of the rarely used streets, and climb 
again, up the endless twisting stairs, to the platform of the public skyport a 
quarter of a mile away.
Matt Ferguson swore irritably as his ankle turned in a rut - since no Centaurian 
citizen ever used the streets for walking if he could help it, they were not 
kept in condition for that purpose - and took his wife's arm, carefully guiding 
her steps on the uneven paving.
"Be careful, Beth," he warned. "You could break your neck without half trying!"
"And all those stairs!" The girl looked sulkily up at the black shadow of the 
skyport platform, stretched over them like a dark wing.  The street lay deserted 
in the lurid light of early evening; red Centaurus, a hov­ering disk at the 
horizon, sent a slanting light, vio­lently crimson, down into the black canyon 
of the street, and the top-heavy houses leaned down, somber and ominous. 
Wavering shadows gloomed down over them, and a hot wind blew down the length of 
the street, bearing that peculiar, pungent, all-pervasive smell which is 
Megaera's atmosphere. A curious blend, not altogether unpleasant, a resinous and 
musky smell which was a little sickish, like perfume worn too long. Beth 
Ferguson supposed that sooner or later she would get used to Megaera's air, that 
combination of stinks and chemical emanations. It was harmless, her husband 
assured her, to human chemistry. But it did not grow less noticeable with time; 
after more than a year, Terran Standard time, on Megaera, it was still freshly 
pungent to her nostrils. Beth wrinkled up her pretty, sullen mouth. "Do we have 
to go to this dinner, Matt?" she asked plaintively.
The man put his foot on the first step. "Of course, Beth. Don't be childish," he 
remonstrated gently, "I told you, before we came to Megaera, that my success at 
this post would depend mostly on my informal relations - " "If you call a dinner 
at the Jeth - sans informal -  " Beth began petulantly, but Matt went on, " - my 
in­formal relations with the Centaurian members of the government. Every 
diplomatic post in the Darkovan League is just the same, dear. Rai Jeth - san 
has gone out of his way to make things easy for both of us." He paused, and they 
climbed in silence for a few steps. "I know you don't like living here. But if I 
can do what I was sent here to do, we can have any diplomatic post in the 
Galaxy. I've got to sell the Centaurian Archons on the idea of building the big 
space station here. And, so far, I'm succeeding at a job no other man would 
take."
"I can't see why you took it," Beth sulked, snatch­ing pettishly at her nylene 
scarf, which was flapping like an unruly bird in the hot, grit-laden wind.
Matt turned and tucked it into place. "Because it was better than working as the 
assistant to the assist­ant to the undersecretary of Terran affairs attached to 
the Proconsul of Vialles. Cheer up, Beth. If this space station gets built, I'll 
have a Proconsulship myself."
"And if it doesn't?"
Matt grinned. "It will. We're doing fine. Most Leg­ates need years to find their 
way around a difficult post like Megaera." The grin melted abruptly. "Rai Jeth - 
san is responsible for that, too. I don't want to offend him."
Beth said, and her voice was not very steady, "I understand all that, Matt. But 
I've been feeling - ah, I hate to be always whining and complaining like this…"
They had reached the wide, flat platform of the skyport. Matt lighted the flare 
which would attract a cariole, and sank down on one of the benches. "You haven't 
whined," he told her tenderly. "I know this rotten planet is no place for a 
Terran girl." He slipped an arm around his wife's waist. "It's hard on you, with 
other Terran women half a continent away, and I know you haven't made many 
friends among the Centaurians. But Rai Jeth - san's wives have been very kind to 
you. Nethle presented you to her Harp Circle. I don't suppose any Terran woman 
for a thousand years has even seen one, let alone been presented - and even 
Cassiana."
"Cassiana!" said Beth with a catch of breath, pick­ing at her bracelet. "Yes, 
Nethle's almost too sweet, but she's in seclusion, and until her baby is born, I 
won't see her. And Wilidh's just a child! But Cas­siana, I can't stand her! 
That, that freak! I'm afraid of her!"
Her husband scowled. "And don't think she doesn't know it! She's telepathic, and 
a rhu'ad."
"Whatever that is," Beth said crossly. "Some sort of mutant."
"Still, she's been kind to you. If you were friends."
"Ugh!" Beth shuddered. "I'd sooner be friends with a Sirian lizard-woman!"
Mart's arm dropped. He said coldly, "Well, please be polite to her, at least. 
Courtesy to the Archon includes all his wives - but particularly Cassiana." He 
rose from the bench. "Here comes our cariole."
The little skycab swooped down to the skyport. Matt helped Beth inside and gave 
the pilot the address of the Archonate. The cariole shot skyward again, wheeling 
toward the distant suburb where the Archon lived. Matt sat stiffly on the seat, 
not looking at his young wife. She leaned against the padding, her fair face 
sulky and rebellious. She looked ready to cry. "At least, in another month, by 
their own stupid cus­toms, I'll have a good excuse to stay away from all these 
idiotic affairs!" she flung at him. "I'll be in seclusion by then!"
It hadn't been the way she'd wanted to tell him, but it served him right!
"Beth!" Matt started upright, not believing.
"Yes, I am going to have a baby! And I'm going into seclusion just like these 
silly women here, and not have to go to a single formal dinner, or Spice Hunt, 
or Harp Circle, for six cycles! So there!"
Matt Ferguson leaned across the seat. His fingers bit hard into her arm and his 
voice sounded hoarse. "Eliz­abeth! Look at me, " he commanded. "Didn't you 
promise - haven't you been taking your anti shots?"
"No…no," Beth faltered, "I wanted to - oh, Matt, I'm alone so much, and we've 
been married now almost four years…"
"Oh, my God," said Matt slowly, and let go her arm. "Oh, my God!" he repeated, 
and sank back, the color draining from his face.
"Will you stop saying that!" Beth raged. "When I tell you a thing like, " her 
voice caught on the edge of a sob, and she buried her face in her scarf.
Matt's hand was rough as he jerked her head up, and the gray pallor around his 
mouth terrified the girl. "You damn little fool," he shouted, then swallowed 
hard and lowered his voice. "I guess it's my fault," he muttered. "I didn't want 
to scare you…you promised to take the shots, so I trusted you - like an idiot!" 
He released her. "It's classified top-secret, Beth, but it's why this place is 
closed to colonization, and it's why Terran men don't bring their wives here. 
This damned, stinking, freak atmosphere! It's perfectly harmless to men, and to 
most women. But for some reason, it plays hell with the female hormones if a 
woman gets pregnant. For 60 years since Terra set up the Le­gation here - not 
one Terran baby has been born alive. Not one, Beth. And eight out of ten women 
who get pregnant - oh, God, Betty, I trusted you!"
She whispered "But this - this was a Terran colony, once."
"They've adapted - maybe. We've never found out why Centaurian women go into 
seclusion when they're pregnant, or why they hide the children so carefully."
He paused, looking down at the thinning jungle of roofs. There would not be time 
to explain it all to Beth. Even if she lived - but Matt did not want to think 
about that. They never sent married men to this planet, but Centaurian custom 
could not admit a sin­gle man to be mature enough to hold a place in 
gov­ernment. He had succeeded at this post where single men, twice his age, had 
been laughed at by the Archons. But what good was that now?
"Oh, God, Beth," he whispered, and his arms went out blindly to hold her close. 
"I don't know what to do."
She sobbed softly, scared, against him. "Oh, Matt, I'm afraid! Can't we go 
home...home to Terra? I want - I want to go home - to go home - "
"How can we?" the man asked drearily. "There won't be a star - ship leaving the 
planet for three months. By that time, you wouldn't be able to live through 
blastoff. Even now, you couldn't pass a physical for space." He was silent for 
minutes, his arms strained around her, and his eyes looked haunted. Then, 
al­most visibly, he managed to pull himself together.
"Look, the first thing tomorrow, I'll take you to the Medical HQ. They've been 
working on it. Maybe... don't worry, darling. We'll get along." His voice lapsed 
again, and Beth, wanting desperately to believe him, could find no reassurance 
in the words. "You're going to be all right," he told her again. "Aren't you?" 
But she clung to him and did not answer. After a long, strained silence, he 
roused a little, and let her go, glancing from the windbreak of the cariole 
cabin.
"Beth, darling, fix your face - " he urged her gently. "We'll be late, and you 
can't go down looking like that - "
For a minute Beth sat still, simply not believing that after what she had told 
him, he would still make her go to the detested dinner. Then, looking at his 
tense face, she suddenly knew it was the one thing on earth - no, she corrected 
herself with grim humor, the one thing on Theta Centaurus IV, Megaera, that she 
must do.
"Tell him not to land for a minute," she said shak­ily. She unfastened her wrist 
compact, and silently began to repair the wreckage of her cosmetics. Above the 
Archonate, the cariole maneuvered frantically for place with another careening 
skycab, and after what seemed an imminent clash of tangled gyroscopes, slid on 
to the skyport only seconds before it. Beth shrieked, and Matt flung the door 
open and abused the pilot in choice Centaurian.
"I compliment you on your perfect command of our language," murmured a soft 
creamy voice, and Matt flushed darkly as he saw the Archon standing at the very 
foot of the roofport. He murmured confused apology; it was hardly the way to 
begin a formal evening. The Archon lipped a buttery smile. "I pray you do not 
think of it. I disregard speech of yours. It is again not spoken." With an air 
of esthetic unconcern, he gestured welcome at Beth, and she stepped down, 
feeling clumsy and awkward. "I stand where you ex­pect me not, only because I 
think Senior Wife mine in cariole this one," the Archon continued. Out of 
cour­tesy to his guests, he was speaking a mangled dialect of Galactic Standard; 
Beth wished irritably that he would talk Centaurian. She understood it as well 
as Matt did. She also had the uncomfortable feeling that the Archon sensed her 
irritation and that it amused him; a sizable fraction of the Megaeran population 
was slightly telepathic.
"You must excusing Cassiana," the Archon offered languidly as he conducted his 
guests across the great open skycourt which was the main room of a Centaurian 
home. "She went to the City, one of our families visiting, for she is rhu'ad, 
and must be ever at their call when she is needed. And Second Wife is most 
fortunately in seclusion, so you must excusing her also," he continued as they 
approached the lighted penthouse. Beth murmured the expected compliments on 
Nethle's coming child. "Youngest wife then be our hostess, and since she not 
used to formal custom, we be like barbarian this night."
Matt gave his wife a vicious nudge in the ribs. "Cut that out," he whispered, 
savagely, and with an effort that turned her face crimson, Beth managed to 
sup­press her rising giggles. Of course there was nothing even faintly informal 
in the arrangement of the pent­house room into which they were conducted, nor in 
the classic and affected poses of the other guests. The women in their stiff 
metallic robes cast polite, aloof glances at Beth's soft drapery, and their 
greetings were chilly, musical murmurs. Under their slitted, hostile eyes, Beth 
felt despairingly that she and Matt were intruders here, barbaric atavisms; too 
big and muscu­lar, too burned by yellow sun, blatantly and vulgarly colorful. 
The Centaurians were little and fragile, not one over five feet tall, bleached 
white by the red - violet sun, their foamy, blue - black hair a curious metallic 
halo above stiff classicized robes. Humans? Yes - but their evolution had turned 
off at right angles a thou­sand years ago. What had those centuries done to 
Megaera and its people?
Swathed in a symbolic costume, Rai Jeth - san's young­est wife Wilidh sat 
stiffly in the great Hostess Chair. She spoke to the guests formally, but her 
mouth quirked up at Beth in the beginnings of a giggle. "Oh, my good little 
friend," she whispered in Galactic Stan­dard, "I die with these formals! These 
are Cassiana's friends, and not mine, for no one knew she would not be here 
tonight! And they laugh at me, and stick up their backs, all stiff, like this - 
" she made a rude gesture, and her topaz eyes glinted with mischief. "Sit here 
by me, Beth, and talk of something very dull and stupid, for I die trying not to 
disgrace me by laughing! When Cassiana comes back."
Wilidh's mirth was infectious. Beth took the indi­cated seat, and they talked in 
whispers, holding hands after the fashion of Centaurian women. Wilidh was too 
young to have adopted the general hostility toward the Terran woman; in many 
ways, she reminded Beth of an eager schoolgirl. It was hard to remember that 
this merry child had been married as long as Beth herself; still more incredible 
that she was already the mother of three children.
Suddenly Wilidh turned color, and stood up, stam­mering confused apologies. 
"Forgive me, forgive me, Cassiana - "
Beth also rose, but the Archon's Senior Wife gestured for them to resume their 
seats. Cassiana was not dressed for formal dining. Her gray street wrap was 
still folded over a plain dress of dark thin stuff, and her face looked naked 
without cosmetics, and very tired. "Never mind, Wilidh. Remain hostess for me, 
if you will." She smiled flittingly at Beth. "I am sorry I am not here to greet 
you." Acknowledging their re­plies with a weary politeness, Cassiana moved past 
them like a wraith, and they saw her walking across the skycourt, and 
disappearing down the wide stairway that led to the lower, private parts of the 
house.
She did not rejoin them until the formal dinner had been served, eaten and 
removed, and the soft - footed servants were padding around the room with bowls 
and baskets of exotic fruit and delicacies and gilded cups of frosty mountain 
nectar. The penthouse shut­ters had been thrown wide, so that the guests could 
watch the flickering play of lightning from the giant magnetic storms which were 
almost a nightly occur­rence on Megaera. They were weirdly beautiful and the 
Centaurians never tired of watching them, but they terrified Beth. She preferred 
the rare calm nights when Megaera's two immense moons filled the sky with 
uncanny green moonlight; but now thick clouds hid the faces of Alecto and 
Tisiphone, and the jagged bolts leaped and cast lurid shadows on the great massy 
clouds. Through the thunder, the eerie noise which passed, on Megaera, for 
music, was wailing from the slitted walls. In its shadow, Cassiana ghosted into 
the room and sat down between Beth and Wilidh. She did not speak for minutes, 
listening with evident enjoy­ment to the music and its counterpoint of thunder. 
Cas­siana was somewhat older than Beth, small and exquisite, a filigree dainty 
woman fashioned of gilded silver. Her ash blonde hair had metallic lights, and 
her skin and eyes had almost the same hue, a gold - cream, smudged with gilt 
freckles, and with a sort of luminous, pearly glow ... the distinguishing mark 
of a curious mutation called rhu'ad. The word itself meant only pearl; neither 
Beth nor any other Terran knew what it implied. The servants were passing around 
tiny baskets, curi­ously woven of reeds from the Sea of Storms. Defer­entially, 
they laid a basket before the three women. "Oh, sharigs!" Wilidh cried with a 
childish gusto. Beth glanced into the basket at the wriggling mass of small, 
greenish - gold octopods, less than three inches long, writhing and struggling 
in their nest of odorous sea­weed and striking feebly at each other with the 
stumps of claws they did not know had been snapped off. The sight disgusted 
Beth, but Wilidh took a pair of tiny tongs and picked up one of the revolting 
little crea­tures, and as Beth watched with fascinated horror, thrust it whole 
into her mouth. Daintily, but with relish, her sharp small teeth crunched the 
shell; she sucked, and fastidiously spat the empty shell into her palm.
"Try one, Beth," Cassiana suggested kindly. "They are really delicious."
"N - no, thank you," Beth said weakly - and sud­denly disgraced herself and all 
her conditioning by turning aside and being very completely and excruciat­ingly 
sick on the shimmering floor. She barely heard Cassiana's cry of distress, 
although she was conscious of a prim offended murmur, and knew she had out­raged 
custom beyond all credibility. Through helpless spasms of retching, she was 
conscious of hands and voices. Then she was picked up in strong familiar arms, 
and heard Matt's worried "Honey, are you all right?"
She knew she was being carried across the skycourt and into a lower room, and 
opened her eyes sickly to see Cassiana and Matt standing over her. "I'm - I'm so 
sorry - " she whispered. Cassiana's thin hand pat­ted hers, comfortingly. "Do 
not think of it," she reas­sured, "Legate Furr-ga - soon, your wife will be well 
enough, you may return to the other guests," she said, gently, but in a tone 
that unmistakably dismissed him. There was no polite way to protest. Matt went, 
look­ing back doubtfully. Cassiana's strange eyes looked rather pitying. "Don't 
try to talk," she admonished. Beth felt too sick and weak to move and being 
alone with Cassiana terrified her. She lay quiet on the big divan, tears 
slipping weakly down her face. Cassiana's hand still clasped hers; in a kind of 
childish petulance, Beth pulled her hand away, but the slender fingers only 
closed more tightly around Beth's wrist. "Be still," said Cassiana, not 
unkindly, but in a tone of absolute command, and she sat there, looking down at 
Beth with a staring intensity, for some minutes. Fi­nally she sighed and freed 
Beth's hand.
"Do you feel better now?"
"Why - yes!" said Beth, surprised. Quite suddenly, the nausea and the pain in 
her head were altogether gone. Cassiana smiled. "I am glad. No - lie quiet. 
Beth, I think you should not ride in cariole tonight, why not stay here? You can 
visit Nethle - she has missed you since she went into seclusion."
Beth almost cried out with surprise. This was rare  -  for an outsider to be 
invited into a Centaurian house any further than the skycourt and penthouse 
reserved for social affairs. Then, with a stab of frightened mem­ory, she 
recalled the reason for Nethle's seclusion  -  and her own fears. Nethle was her 
friend, even Cassiana had shown her kindness. Perhaps hi a less formal 
atmosphere she might be able to ask something about the curious taboo which 
surrounded the birth of chil­dren on Megaera, perhaps learn some way of averting 
her own danger . . . she closed her eyes and leaned against the cushions for a 
moment. If nothing else, it meant reprieve. For a little while she need not face 
Matt's gallantly concealed fear, his reproach. . . .
Matt, returning with Cassiana, quickly gave con­sent. "If that's what you really 
want, honey," he said gently. As she looked up into his tense face, Beth's 
impulse suddenly changed. She wanted to cry out "No -  don't leave me here, take 
me home - "a night here in this strange place, alone with Centaurian women who 
were, however friendly they might be, entirely alien, seemed a thing too fearful 
to contemplate. She felt inclined to cry. But Cassiana's eyes on her proved 
rather steadying, and Beth's long conditioning in the ceremonial life necessary 
on Megaera triumphed over emotions she knew to be irrational.
Her husband bent and kissed her lightly. "I'll send a cariole for you tomorrow," 
he promised. 
The lower portions of a Centaurian home were espe­cially designed for a 
polygamous society in harmony with itself. They were carefully compartmented, 
and the only entrance from one to the other was from the great common stairway 
which led to the roof and skycourt. Roughly a third of the house was sectioned 
off for the habitation of Rai Jeth - san and his seasonal consort. The remainder 
was women's quarters, and the Archon himself might not enter them without 
spe­cific invitation. In effect, Megaera's polygamous soci­ety was a rotational 
monogamy, for although Rai Jeth - san had three wives - the legal maximum was 
five - he had only one at a tune and their alteration was strictly regulated by 
tradition. The surplus women lived together, always on terms of the most cordial 
friendship. Cassiana took precedence over the others, by custom, but there was 
the closest affection among all three - which had surprised Beth at first, 
especially when she found out that this was by no means rare; the bond between 
the wives of one man was tradition­ally the strongest family tie in existence, 
far stronger than the tie between natural sisters. Beth had discovered long ago 
that she was not alone in her awe of Cassiana, who was one of the peculiar 
patriciate of the planet. Men and women fought for the privilege of serving the 
rhu'ads; Beth, relaxing into the almost sybaritic luxury of the women's 
quarters, wondered again what was Cassiana's strange power over the Centaurians? 
She knew Cassiana was one of the rare telepaths who were found in the Darkovan 
planets, but that alone would not have explained it, nor would Cassiana's odd 
beauty. On Megaera there were perhaps 10,000 women like Cassiana: curiously 
beautiful, more curiously revered. There were no male rhu'ad. Beth had seen both 
men and women throw themselves to the ground in a burst of spontaneous emotion 
as one of the small, pearl - colored women passed, but had never understood, or 
dared to ask. Cassiana asked her, "Would you like to see Nethle before you sleep 
- and our children?"
This was, indeed, a strange relaxation of tradition; Beth knew no Terran had 
ever seen a Centaurian child. Astonished, she followed Cassiana into a lower 
room.
It seemed full of children. Beth counted; there were nine, the youngest only a 
baby in arms, the oldest about ten. They were pale, pretty children, like 
hot­house flowers reared in secret. Seeing the stranger, they clustered 
together, whispering to each other tim­idly, staring with wide eyes at her 
strange hair and curious garments.
"Come here, my darlings," said Cassiana in her soft pleasant voice. "Don't 
stare." She was speaking in Centaurian, a further gesture of friendliness.
One little boy - the rest of the children were all girls - piped up valiantly, 
"Is she another mother for us?"
Cassiana laughed. "No, my son. Aren't three moth­ers enough?" Nethle rose from a 
cushiony chair and came to Beth, her hands outstretched in welcome. "I thought 
you had forgotten me! Of course, you poor Terran women, only one wife to look 
after a husband, I cannot see how you ever have time for anything!"
Beth blushed. Nethle's outspoken references to Beth's "unhappy" state as a 
solitary wife, always em­barrassed her. But she returned Nethle's greeting with 
genuine pleasure. Nethle Jeth - san was perhaps the only Centaurian whom Beth 
could tolerate without that sense of uneasy dislike.
She said, "I've missed you, Nethle," but secretly she was dismayed at the change 
in her friend. Since Nethle had gone into seclusion, months ago, she had changed 
frighteningly. In spite of the distortion of pregnancy, Nethle seemed to have 
lost weight, her small face looked haggard, and her skin was a ghastly color. 
She walked shakily, and sat down almost at once after greeting Beth, but her gay 
manner and brilliant joyous eyes belied her illness. She and Beth talked 
quietly, about inconsequential things - Centaurian custom almost outlawed 
serious conversation - while Cassiana curled up, kitten - like, in a nest of 
soft pillows, picking up the littlest baby.
Two toddlers came and tried to crawl up on her knees at once, so Cassiana 
laughed and slid down on the floor, letting the children climb all over her, 
snug­gle against her shoulder, tug at her garments and her elaborately arranged 
hair. She was so tiny that she looked like a little girl with a lapful of dolls. 
Beth asked her - hesitantly, for she did not know if it was polite to ask - 
"Which are your children, Cassiana?"
Cassiana glanced up. "In a way, all, and in another way, none," she said curtly 
and Beth thought she had trespassed on courtesy; but Nethle put her hand on the 
solitary boy's head. "Cassiana has no children, Beth. She is rhu'ad, and rhu'ad 
women do not bear children. This is my son, and the oldest girl, and the girl 
with long hair. Those," she indicated the twin toddlers and the baby in 
Cassiana's lap, "are Wilidh's. The rest are Clotine's. Clotine was our sister, 
who died many cycles ago."
Cassiana gently put the children aside and came to Beth. She looked at one of 
the little girls playing in the corner. She made no sound, but the child turned 
and suddenly ran to Cassiana, flinging her arms around the rhu'ad. Cassiana 
hugged her, then let her go, and - to Beth's surprise - the tiny girl came and 
tugged at Beth's skirt, clambering into her lap. Beth put an arm around her, 
looking down in astonishment.
"Why, she…" she broke off, not knowing, again, whether she should remark on the 
extraordinary likeness. The tiny girl - she seemed about four - had the same, 
pearly, lustrous skin; her hair was a silvery eiderdown, pallid and patrician. 
Cassiana noted her discomfiture and laughed gaily. "Yes, Arli is rhu'ad. She is 
mine."
"I thought - "
"Oh, Cassiana, stop it," Nethle protested, laughing. "She doesn't understand!"
"There are many things she does not understand," said Cassiana abruptly, "but I 
think she will have to learn to understand them. Beth, you have done a terri­bly 
unwise thing. Terran women cannot have children here in safety!"
Beth could only blink in amazement. The self - test taken the day before had 
shown her pregnancy to be less than a month advanced. "How ever did you know?" 
she asked.
"Your poor husband," Cassiana's voice was gentle. "I felt his fear like a gray 
murk, all evening. It is not pleasant to be telepath, sometimes. It is why I try 
not to go in crowds, I cannot help invading the privacy of others. Then, when 
you were so sick, I knew."
Nethle seemed to freeze, to go rigid. Her arms fell to her sides. "So that is 
it!" she whispered almost inaudibly. Then she burst out, "And that is the way 
with the women of Terra! That is why your Earthmen will never take this planet! 
As long as they despise us and come as conquerors, they cannot come here where 
their women die!" Her eyes glared. She rose and stood, heavy, distorted, 
menacing, over Beth, her lips drawn back in an animal snarl, her arm raised as 
if to strike. Cassiana gasped, sprang up, and with a surpris­ing strength, she 
pushed Nethle back into her chair.
"Beth, she is raving - even women here, sometimes…"
"Raving!" Nethle said with a curl of her lip. "Wasn't there a day when our women 
and their unborn chil­dren died by the hundreds because we did not know the air 
was poison? When women died, or were kept in airtight rooms and given oxygen 
till their children were born, and then left to die? When men married a dozen 
wives to be sure of one living child? Did the Terrans help us then, when we 
begged hem to evacu­ate the planet? No! They had a war on their hands - for 600 
years they had a war on their hands! Now they've finished their private wars, 
they try to come back to Megaera - "
"Nethle! Be quiet!" Cassiana commanded angrily. Beth had sunk into the cushions, 
but through her cupped hands she saw that Nethle's face blazed, a contorted mask 
of fury. "Yes, yes, Cassiana," her voice was a mocking croon, "Beth condescends 
to make friends with me - and now she will see what happens to the women of 
Terra who mock our customs instead of finding out why we have them!" The 
wildness of her hysteria beat and battered at Beth. "Oh, yes, I liked you," she 
snarled, "but could you really be friends with a Centaurian woman? Don't you 
think I know you mock our rhu'ad? Could you live equal to us? Get out!" she 
shouted. "Get off our world! Go away, all of you! Leave us in peace!"
"Nethle!" Cassiana grasped the woman's shoulders and shook her, hard, until the 
wildness went out of her face. Then she pushed Nethle down in the cush­ions, 
where she lay sobbing. Cassiana looked down at her sorrowfully. "You hate worse 
than she hates. How can there ever be peace, then?"
"You have always defended her," Nethle muttered, "and she hates you worst of 
all!"
"That is exactly why I have more responsibility," Cassiana answered. She went to 
the curtained door at the end of the room. At her summons, a servant came and 
began unobtrusively to shepherd the children out of the room. They went 
obediently, the older ones looking scared and bewildered, glancing timidly at 
the weeping Nethle; the little ones reluctant, clinging to Cassiana, pouting a 
little as she gently pushed them out the door. Cassiana drew the curtain firmly 
down behind them; then went back to Nethle and touched her on the shoulder. 
"Listen," she said.
Then Beth had the curious feeling that Nethle and Cassiana were conversing 
through some direct mental exchange from which she was excluded. Their chang­ing 
expressions, and faint gestures, told her that, and a few emphatic, spoken words 
seemed to give point to the soundless conversation - it made Beth's flesh crawl.
"My decisions are always final," Cassiana stated.
Nethle muttered ". . . cruel of you . . ."
Cassiana shook her head.
After long minutes of speech - silence, Cassiana said aloud, quietly, "No, I 
have decided. I did it for Clotine. I would do it for you - or for Wilidh, if 
you were fool enough to try what Beth has done."
Nethle flared back, "I wouldn't be fool enough to try to have a baby that way - 
"
Cassiana checked her with a gesture, rose, and went to Beth, who was still lying 
huddled in the pillows of the big divan. "If I, who am rhu'ad, do not break the 
laws," she said, "then no one will ever dare to break them, and our planet will 
stagnate in dead traditions. Beth, if you can promise to obey me, and to ask me 
no questions, then I, who am rhu'ad. promise you this: you may have your child 
without fear, and your chance of life will be" she hesitated, "equal to a 
Centaurian woman's."
Beth looked up…speechless, her eyes wide. A dozen emotions tangled in some 
secret part of her mind, fear, distrust, anger. Yet reason told her that 
Cassiana was showing disinterested kindness in the face of what must certainly 
have been obvious to her, Beth's own dislike. At the moment Beth was unaware 
that prox­imity to the telepath was sharpening her own sense perceptions, but 
for the first time in months she was thinking reasonably, unblurred by emotion.
Cassiana insisted, "Can you promise? Can you prom­ise, especially, not to ask me 
questions about what I have to do?"
And Beth nodded soberly. "I'll promise," she said.
The pale pink, watery sunlight looked feeble and anachronistic on the white, 
sterile, characteristically Terran walls, floors and furnishings of the Medical 
HQ; and the white indoor face of the old doctor looked like some sun - sheltered 
slug.
"He's lived here so long, he's half Centaurian him­self," Matt Ferguson thought 
irrelevantly, and threw down the chart in his hand. "You mean there's noth­ing 
to be done!" he said bluntly.
"We never say that in my profession," Dr. Bonner told him simply. "While there's 
life, and all the rest of it. But it looks bad. You never should have left it up 
to the girl to make sure she took her anti shots. Women aren't reliable about 
that kind of thing - not normal women. A woman's got to be pretty damned 
abnormal, to be conscientious about contraceptives." He frowned. "You know, it's 
not a question of adapt­ing, either. If anything, the third, fourth, fourteenth 
generations are more susceptible than the first. The planet seems so perfectly 
healthy that women simply don't believe it until they do get pregnant, and then 
it's too late."
"Abortion?" Matt suggested, lowering his head. Dr. Bonner shrugged. "Worse yet. 
Operative shock on top of the hormone reaction would just kill her now, in­stead 
of later." He leaned his head on his hands. "Whatever it is in the air, it 
doesn't hurt anybody until we get the flood of female hormones released in 
preg­nancy. We've tried everything  -  manufacturing our own air chemically 
pure, but we can't get that stink out of it, and we can't keep it pure. There's 
just something linked into the atomic structure of the whole damned planet. It 
doesn't bother test animals, so we can't do any experimenting. It's just the 
human, female hor­mones of pregnancy. We've even tried locking the women in 
airtight domes, and giving them pure oxy­gen, the whole nine months. But we get 
the same reaction. Pernicious vomiting, weight loss, confusion of the balance 
centers, convulsions - and if the foetus isn't aborted, it's oxygen - starved 
and a monster. I've lived on Megaera 40 years, Matt, and I haven't deliv­ered a 
live baby yet."
Matt raged, "Then how do the Centaurians man­age? They have children, all 
right!"
"Have you ever seen one?" asked Dr. Bonner tersely.
At Matt's denial, he continued, "Neither have I - in 40 years. For all I know, 
Centaurian women cultivate their babies in test tubes. Nobody's ever seen a 
preg­nant Centaurian woman, or a child under about ten years old. But one of our 
men - ten, twelve years ago - got a Centaurian girl pregnant. Of course, her 
family threw her out - right in the damn' street. Our man married the girl - 
he'd wanted to, anyhow. The man - I won't tell you his name - brought her in to 
me. I thought maybe - but the story was just exactly the same. Nausea, 
pernicious vomiting  -  all the rest. You wouldn't believe the things we tried 
to save that girl. I didn't know I had so much imagination myself." He dropped 
his eyes, bitter with an old failure. "But she died. The baby lived. It's up in 
the incurable ward."
"Jesus!" Matt shuddered uncontrollably. "What can I do?"
Dr. Bonner's eyes were very sorrowful. "Bring her in, Matt, right away. We'll do 
our damnedest for her." His hand found the younger man's shoulder as he rose, 
but Matt was not conscious of the touch. He never knew how he got out of the 
building, but after a reeling walk through streets that twisted around his 
bleared eyes, he heard the buzz of a descending cariole, and Cassiana Jeth - 
san's level voice.
"Legate Furr - ga - soon?"
Matt raised his head numbly. She was about the last person he cared to see. But 
Matt Ferguson was a Legate of the Terran Empire, and had undergone strenuous 
conditioning for this post. He could no more have been rude to anyone to whom 
courtesy was re­quired, than he could have thrown himself from a moving cariole. 
So he said with careful graciousness, "I greet you, Cassiana."
She signaled the pilot to set the hovering skycab down.
"This meeting is fortunate," she said quietly. "Get into this cariole, and ride 
with me."
Matt obeyed, mostly because he lacked, at the moment, the ingenuity to form an 
acceptable excuse. He climbed in; the skycab began to ascend again over the 
city. It seemed a long time before Cassiana said, "Bet1 is at the Archonate. I 
have made a finding the most unfortunate. Understand me, Legate, you are in 
situa­tion of the baddest."
"I know," Matt said grimly. His wife's dislike of Cassiana suddenly became 
reasonable to him. He had never been alone with a telepath before, and it made 
him a little giddy. There was almost a physical vibra­tion in the small woman's 
piercing gaze. Cassiana's mangling of Galactic Standard - she spoke it better 
than her husband, but still abominably - was another irritation which Matt tried 
to hide. As if in answer to his unspoken thought, Cassiana switched to her own 
language. "Why did you come to Megaera?"
What a fool question, Matt thought irritably. Why did any man take a diplomatic 
post? "My government sent me."
"But not because you liked Megaera, or us? Not because you wanted to live here, 
or cared about Ter­rans and Centaurians getting along? Not because you cared 
about the space station?"
Matt paused, honestly surprised. "No," he said, "I suppose not." Then annoyance 
triumphed. "How can we live together? Your people don't travel in space. Ours 
can't live in health or ordinary comfort on this -  this stinking planet! How 
can we do anything but live apart and leave you to yourselves?"
Cassiana said slowly, "We wanted, once, to aban­don this colony. For all Terra 
cared, we could live or die. Now they have found out their lost property might 
be worth."
Matt sighed. "The Imperialists who abandoned Megaera have all been dead for 
hundreds of years," he pointed out wearily. "Now, we have to have some contact 
with your planet, because of the political situa­tion. You know that. No one is 
trying to exploit Megaera."
"I know that," she admitted. "Perhaps 50 other people on the whole planet 
realize that. The rest are one seething mass of public opinion, and under the 
anti - propaganda laws, we can't change that." She stopped. "But I didn't want 
to talk politics. Why did you bring Beth here, Legate?"
Matt bit his lip. Under her clear eyes he told the truth. "Because I knew a 
single man couldn't succeed at this post."
Cassiana mused. "It's a pity. It's almost certain that this affair will close 
out the Legation here. No married man will want to come, and we cannot accept a 
single man in such an important position. It is against our most respected 
tradition for a man to remain single after he is mature. Our only objection to 
your space station is the immense flood of unattached personnel who will come 
here to build it - drifters, unmarried men, military persons - such an influx 
would throw Megaera into confusion. We would be glad to accept married colonists 
who wanted to settle here."
"You know that's impossible!" Matt said.
"Maybe," Cassiana said thoughtfully. "It is a pity. Because it is obvious that 
the Terrans need Megaera, and Megaera needs some outside stimulus. We're 
turn­ing stagnant." She was silent for a minute. Then she continued, "But I'm 
talking politics again. I suppose I wanted to see if it was in you to be honest. 
Perhaps, if you had grown angry sooner, been less concerned with polite 
formalities - angry men are honest men. We like honesty, we rhu'ad."
Mart's smile was bitter. "We are conditioned in courtesy. Honesty comes second."
"A proof that you are not suited to a society where any fraction of the 
population is telepathic," said Cassiana bluntly. "But that is not important. 
This is - Beth is in very real danger, Legate. I promise nothing   -  even we 
Centaurians die sometimes - but if you will let her live at the Archonate for 
three, maybe four of your months. I think I can promise you she'll live. And 
probably the baby, too."
Hope seethed in Matt. "You mean go into seclu­sion…"
"That, and more," said Cassiana gravely. "You must not attempt to see her 
yourself, and you must keep your entire Legation from knowing where she is, or 
why. That includes your personal friends and your officials. Can you do this? If 
not, I promise nothing."
"But that isn't possible."
Cassiana dismissed the protest. "It is your problem. I am not a Terran, I don't 
know how you will manage it."
"Does Beth want to."
"At this moment, no. You are her husband, and it is your child's life at stake. 
You have authority to order her to do it."
"We don't think of things that way on Terra. I don't."
"You are not on Terra now," Cassiana reminded him flatly.
"Can I see Beth before I decide? She'll want to make arrangements, pack her 
things."
"No, you must decide here, now. It may already be too late. As for her 'things,' 
" the pearly eyes held delicate scorn, "she must have nothing from Terra near 
her."
"What kind of rubbish is that?" Matt demanded. "Not even her clothes?"
"I will provide anything she needs," Cassiana as­sured him. "Believe me, it is 
necessary. No - don't apologize. Anger is honesty."
"Look," Matt suggested, still trying to compromise acceptably. "I'll want her to 
see a Terran doctor, first, the authorities - "
Without warning, Cassiana lost her temper.
"You Terrans," she exploded, in a gust of fury that was like a physical blow. 
"You stupid lackwit from a planet of insane authoritarians, I told you, you must 
say nothing to anyone! This isn't a political matter, it's her life, and your 
child's! What can your so - called authorities do?"
"What can you do?" Matt shouted back. Protocol went overboard. The man and woman 
from two alien star systems glared at each other across a thousand years of 
evolution. Then Cassiana said coldly, "That is the first sensible question you 
have asked. When our planet was jettisoned as useless - we had to acquire 
certain tech­niques the hard way. I can't tell you exactly what. It isn't 
allowed. If that answer is not adequate, I am sorry. It is the only answer you 
will ever get. Wars have been fought on Megaera because the rhu'ad have refused 
to answer that question. We've been hounded and stoned, and sometimes worshiped. 
Between sci­ence and religion and politics, we've finally worked out the answer, 
but I have never told even my hus­band. Do you think I would tell a bureaucrat 
from Terra? You can accept my offer or refuse it now."
Matt looked over the windbreak of the cariole at the wideflung roofs of the 
city. He felt torn with terrible indecision. Reared in a society of elaborately 
dele­gated responsibilities, it went against all his condition­ing - how could 
one man make a decision like this? How could he explain Beth's absence? What 
would his government say if they discovered that he had not even consulted the 
medical authorities? Still, the choice was bald - Bonner had made it very clear 
that he had no hope. It was: trust Cassiana, or watch Beth die.
And the death would be neither quick nor easy.
"All right," he said, pressing his lips together. "Beth…Beth doesn't like you, 
as you probably know, and I'll be - I'll be everlastingly damned if I know why 
you are doing this! But I can't see any other way out. This isn't a very polite 
way to put it, but it was you who insisted on honesty. Go ahead. Do what you 
can. I…" his voice suddenly strangled, but the little rhu'ad did not take the 
slightest notice of his losing struggle for self - control. With an air of 
remote detach­ment, she directed the driver of the cariole to set him down 
before the Residence.
During the brief ride there, she did not speak a word. Only when the cariole 
settled on the public skyport did she raise her head. "Remember," she said 
quietly, "you must not call at the Archonate, or at­tempt to see Beth. If you 
have business with the Archon, you must arrange to meet him elsewhere. That will 
not be easy."
"Cassiana - what can I say - "
"Say nothing," she advised, not smiling, but there was a glint in the pearly 
eyes. In a less reserved face, it might have been friendly amusement. "Sometimes 
men are more honest that way."
She left him staring dumbly upward as the cariole climbed the sky once more.
When Cassiana - no longer friendly, but reserved and rigid - had brought the 
news that Matt had com­manded her to stay, Beth had disbelieved had shouted her 
hysterical disbelief and terror until Cassiana turned and walked out, locking 
the door behind her. She did not return for three days. Beth saw no one but an 
old lady who brought her meals and was, or pretended to be, deaf. In that time, 
Beth lived through a million emotions; but at the end of three days, when 
Cassiana came back, she looked at Beth with approval.
"I left you alone," she explained briefly, "to see how you reacted to fear and 
confinement. If you could not endure it, I could have done nothing for you. But 
I see you are quite calm."
Beth bit her lip, looking down at the smaller woman. "I was angry," she 
admitted. "I didn't think it was necessary to treat me like a child. But somehow 
I don't think you would have done it without good reason."
Cassiana's smile was a mere flicker. "Yes. I can read your mind a little, not 
much. I'm afraid you will be a prisoner again, for some time. Do you mind much? 
We'll try to make it easy for you."
"I'll do whatever you say," Beth promised calmly, and the rhu'ad nodded. "Now, I 
think you mean that, Beth."
"I meant it when I said it before!" Beth protested. "Your brain, and your 
reason, said it. But a preg­nant woman's reasoning faculties aren't always 
reli­able. I had to be certain that your emotions would back up your reason in 
the event of a shock. Believe me, you'll get some shocks."
But so far there had been none, although Cassiana had not exaggerated in the 
slightest when she said Beth would be a prisoner. The Terran woman was confined 
closely in two rooms on the ground floor - a level rarely used in a Centaurian 
house - and saw no one but Cassiana, Nethle and a servant or two. The rooms were 
spacious - even luxurious - and the air was filtered by some process which - 
while it did not di­minish the distinctive smell was somehow less sicken­ing, 
and easier to breathe. "This air is just as dangerous, chemically, as that 
outdoors," Cassiana cautioned her. "Don't think that this, alone, makes you 
safe. But it may make you a little more comfortable. Don't go outside these 
rooms."
But she kept her promise to make imprisonment easy for Beth. Nethle, too, had 
recovered from her hysterical attack, and was punctiliously cordial. Beth had 
access to Cassiana's library - one of the finest tape collections on the planet, 
although, from a little judi­cious searching Beth decided that Cassiana had 
re­moved tapes on some subjects she thought the Terran woman should not study 
too closely - and when Cas­siana learned that Beth knew the rather rare art of 
three - dimensional painting, she asked her guest to teach her. They made 
several large figures, working together. Cassiana had a quick, artistic 
sensitivity which delighted Beth, and she swiftly mastered the complicated 
tech­nique. The shared effort taught them a good deal about each other.
But there was much inconvenience which Cassiana's kindness could not mitigate. 
With each advancing day, Beth's discomfort became more acute. There was pain, 
and sickness, and a terrible feeling of breathlessness for hours she would lie 
fighting for every breath. Cassiana told her that her system, in the hormone 
allergy, had lost the ability, in part, to absorb oxygen from the bloodstream. 
She broke out in violent rashes which never lasted more than a few hours, but 
re­curred every few days. The ordinary annoyances of early pregnancy were there, 
top, magnified a hundred times. And during the electric storms, there was a 
strange reaction, a taut pain as if her body were a conductor for the 
electricity itself. She wondered if this pain were psychosomatic or genuinely 
symptom­atic, but she never knew.
For some reason, the sickness receded when Cassiana was in the room, and as the 
days slid past. Cassiana was with her almost constantly, once or twice even 
sleeping in the same room, on a cot pushed close to Beth's. Unexpectedly, one 
day, Beth asked her, "Why do I always feel better when you are in the room?"
Cassiana did not answer for a minute. All the morn­ing, they had been working on 
a three - dimensional painting. The floor was scattered with eyepieces and 
pigments, and Cassiana picked up an eyepiece and scanned a figure in the 
foreground before she even turned around to Beth. Then she disengaged her 
paint­ing cone, and began to refill it with pigment.
"I wondered when you would ask me that. A telepath's mind controls her body, to 
some extent -  that's a very rough way of putting it, but you don't know enough 
about psychokinetics to know the differ­ence. Well, when we are working 
together, as we have been today, your mind is in what we telepaths call 
vibratory harmony with mine, and you are able to pick up, to a very slight 
degree, my mental projec­tions. And they, in turn, react on your body."
"You mean you control your body by thinking!"
"Everybody does that." Cassiana smiled faintly. "Yes, I know what you mean. I 
can, for instance, control reflexes which are involuntary in - in normal 
people.' Just as easily as you would flex or relax a muscle in your arm, I can 
control my heartbeat, blood pressure, uterine contractions - " she stopped 
abruptly, then fin­ished, "and I can control gross reflexes, such as vomiting, 
in others - if they come within the kinetic field." She put down the spinning - 
cone. "Look at me, and I'll show you what I mean."
Beth obeyed. After a moment, Cassiana's gilt hair began to darken. It grew 
darker, darker, till the shin­ing strands were the color of clear honey. 
Cassiana's cheeks seemed to lose their pearly luster, to turn pinker. Beth 
blinked and rubbed her eyes. "Are you control­ling my mind so I think your skin 
and hair are chang­ing color?" she asked suspiciously.
"You overestimate my powers! No, but I concen­trated all the latent pigment in 
my skin into my hair. We rhu'ad can look almost as we choose, within cer­tain 
limits - I couldn't, for instance, make my hair as dark as yours. There simply 
isn't enough melanin in my pigment. Even this much color wouldn't last, un­less 
I wanted to alter my adrenalin balance perma­nently. I could do that, too, but 
it wouldn't be sensible. My hair and skin will change back to rhu'ad during the 
day - we keep our distinctive coloring, because it's a protection against being 
harmed or injured acciden­tally. We are important to Megaera," abruptly she 
stopped again, and a mask of reticence slid down on her face. She re - engaged 
the spinning - cone and began to weave a surface pattern in the frame.
Beth persisted. "Can you control my body too?"
"A little," said Cassiana shortly. "Why do you think I spend so much time with 
you?"
Snubbed, Beth took up her spinning - cone and be­gan to weave depth into 
Cassiana's surface figure. After a minute, Cassiana relented and smiled, "Oh, 
yes, I enjoy your company too. I did not at first, but I do now."
Beth laughed, a little shamefacedly. She had begun to like Cassiana very much - 
once she had grown ac­customed to Cassiana's habit of answering what Beth was 
thinking, instead of what she had said.
Weeks slid into months. Beth had now lost all desire to go out of doors, 
although she dutifully took what slight exercise Cassiana required of her. The 
rhu'ad now remained with her almost continually. Although Beth was far too ill 
to study Cassiana, it finally be­came apparent even to her that Cassiana herself 
was far from well. The change in the rhu'ad was not marked; tenseness in her 
movements, a pallor Beth could not guess the nature of her ailment. But in spite 
of this, Cassiana watched over Beth with careful kindli­ness. Had she been 
Cassiana's own child, Beth thought, the rhu'ad could not have cared for her more 
solici­tously.
Beth did not know that she was so dangerously ill as to shock Cassiana out of 
her reserve. She could not walk more than a step or two without nausea and a 
shooting, convulsive pain. The nights were a horror. She knew faintly that they 
had given her oxygen sev­eral times, and even this had left her half 
asphyxiated. And although it was now past the time when her child should have 
quickened, she had felt no stir of life.
Half the time she was dizzy, as if drugged. In her rare moments of lucidity, it 
disturbed her that Cassiana should spend her strength in tending her. But when 
she tried to voice this, Cassiana returned only a terse, hostile, "You think of 
yourself and I will take care of myself, and you too."
But once, when Cassiana thought Beth asleep, Beth heard her mutter aloud, "It's 
too slow! I can't wait much longer I'm afraid!"
No news from the Terran sector penetrated her seclusion. She missed Matt, and 
wondered how he had managed to conceal her long absence. But she did not spend 
much time wondering; life, for her, had been stripped bare of everything except 
the fight for sur­vival in each successive day. She had slipped so far down into 
this vegetable existence that she actually shuddered when Cassiana asked her one 
morning, "Do you feel well enough to go out of doors?" She dressed herself 
obediently, but roused a little when Cassiana held a heavy bandage toward her. 
There was compas­sion in her eyes.
"I must blindfold you. No one may know where the kail' rhu'ad is. It is too 
holy."
Beth frowned pettishly. She felt horribly ill, and Cassiana's mystical tone 
filled her with disbelieving disgust. Cassiana saw, and her voice softened.
She said persuasively, "You must do this, Beth. I promise I will explain 
everything some day."
"But why blindfold me? Won't you trust me not to tell, if it's secret?"
"I might trust you and I might not," Cassiana re­turned coldly. "But there are 
10,000 rhu'ad on Megaera, and I am doing this on my single responsibility." Then 
suddenly her hands clenched so tightly on Beth's that the Terran woman almost 
cried out with pain, and she said harshly, "I can die too, you know! The Terran 
women who have died here, don't you think anyone ever tried - " her voice 
trailed off, indistinct, and sud­denly she began to cry softly.
It was the first time since Beth had known her that the rhu'ad had betrayed any 
kind of emotion. Cassiana sobbed, "Don't fight me, Beth, don't! Both our lives 
may depend on your personal feelings about me in the next few days - I can't 
reach you when you're hating me! Try not to hate me so much - "
"I don't hate you, Cassiana," Beth breathed, shocked, and she drew the 
Centaurian girl close and held her, almost protectingly, until the stormy 
weeping quieted and Cassiana had herself under control again.
The rhu'ad freed herself from Beth's arms, gently, her voice reserved again. 
"You had better calm your­self," she said briefly, and handed Beth the scarf. 
"Tie this over your eyes. I'll trust you to do it securely."
Sometimes Beth tried to remember in detail what happened after Cassiana removed 
the blindfold, and she found herself in a vast, vaulted room of unbeliev­able 
beauty. The opalescent dome admitted a filtered, frosty glimmer of pallid light. 
The walls, washed in some light pigment which both absorbed and reflected colors 
too vague to be identified, drifted with hazy shadows. Beth was oblivious to the 
emotional appeal of the place - she was too alien for that - but the place was 
unmistakably a temple, and Beth began to be afraid. She had heard about some of 
the extra - terrestrial religions, and she had always suspected that the rhu'ad 
filled some religious function. But the beauty of the place touched even her, 
and gradually she became conscious of a low vibration, almost sound, pervading 
the entire building.
Cassiana whispered, "That's a telepathic damper. It cuts out the external 
vibrations and allows the aug­mentation of others."
The vibration had a soothing effect. Beth sat qui­etly, waiting, and Cassiana 
was altogether silent, her eyes closed, her lips moving as if she prayed, but 
Beth realized afterward that she was simply conversing telepathically with some 
unseen person. Later, she arose and led Beth through a door which she carefully 
closed and fastened behind them.
This inner chamber was smaller, and was furnished only with a few immense 
machines - Beth assumed they were machines, for they were enclosed anony­mously 
in metallic casings, and dials and controls and levers projected chastely from a 
covering of gray paint -  and a few small couches, arranged in pairs. Here three 
rhu'ad were waiting - slight patrician women who ig­nored Beth entirely and only 
glanced at Cassiana.
Cassiana told Beth to lie down on one of the couches, and, leaving her there, 
went to the other rhu'ad. They stood, their hands laced together, for minutes. 
Beth, by now habituated to Cassiana's moods, could guess that her friend was 
disturbed, even defiant. The others seemed equally disturbed; they shook their 
heads and made gestures that looked angry, but finally Cassiana's fair face 
looked triumphant and she came back to Beth.
"They are going to let me do what I planned. No, lie still - " she instructed, 
and to Beth's surprise, Cassiana lay down on the other couch of the pair. This 
one was located immediately beneath one of the big machines; the control panel 
was located in such a way that Cassiana could reach up and manipulate the dials 
and levers. This she proceeded to do, assuring herself that all were within easy 
reach; then reached across and touched Beth's pulse lightly. She frowned.
"Too fast - you're excited, or frightened. Here, hold my hand for a minute." 
Obediently Beth closed her hand around the one Cassiana extended. She forced 
back her questions, but Cassiana seemed to sense them. "Sssh...Don't talk, Beth. 
Here, where the vibrations are dampered, I can control your involuntary 
reactions too." And, after a few minutes, the Terran woman actually felt her 
heartbeat slowing to normal, and knew that her breathing was quiet and natural 
again.
Cassiana took her hand away, reached upward, and began to adjust a dial, her 
delicate fingers feeling for a careful calibration. "Just lie quietly," she 
warned Beth, but Beth felt not the slightest desire to move. Warmth and well - 
being held her lapped in comfort. It was not a perceptible thing, but an 
intangible vibration, almost but not quite sensible to her nerves. For the first 
time in months, she was wholly free of discomfort.
Cassiana was fussing with the dials, touching one control, discarding another, 
playing the vibration now upward until it was almost visible, no downward until 
it disappeared into sound. Beth began to feel a little dizzy. Her senses seemed 
augmented, she was so wholly conscious of every nerve and muscle in her body 
that she could feel Cassiana's presence, a few feet away, through the nerves of 
her skin. The particular sensa­tion identified Cassiana as completely as her 
voice. Beth even felt it - an odd little coldness - when one of the other rhu'ad 
approached the couch . . . and when she moved away again.
I suppose, she thought, this is what it feels like to be telepathic. And 
Cassiana's thoughts seemed to pene­trate her brain like so many tiny needles: 
Yes, almost like that. Actually, it's just the electrical vibration of your body 
being put into phase with mine. That's a kind of short - term telepathy. Each 
individual has his own personal wave - length. We're tuned in to each other now. 
We used to have to do this telepathically, and it was a horrible ordeal. Now we 
use the dampers, and it's easy.
Beth seemed to float somewhere, weightless, above her body. A rhu'ad had walked 
through the edge of the vibratory field; Beth felt the shock of their out - of - 
phase bodies, as a painful electric jolt which gradually lessened as they 
adjusted into the vibration. Then she smelled a sharp - sweet smell, and with 
her augmented consciousness knew it was a smell of anesthetic - what were they 
going to do? In a spasm of panic she began to struggle; felt steady hands 
quieting her, heard strange voices - 
Her body exploded in a million fragments of light.
The room, the machines and the rhu'ad were gone. Beth was lying on a low, wide 
shelf, built into the wall of a barren cubicle. She felt sick and breathless, 
and tried to sit up, but pain shot through her body and she lay still, blinking 
back tears of agony. She lay gasping, feeling the weight of her child holding 
her like a vise of iron.
As details came back to her clearing sight, she made out a second shelf across 
the room. What she had at first taken for a heap of padding was the body of a 
woman - it was Cassiana - sprawled face downward in an attitude of complete 
exhaustion. As Beth looked, the rhu'ad turned over and opened her eyes; they 
looked immense and bloodshot in the whiteness of her face. She whispered 
hoarsely, "How - do you - feel?"
"A little sick - "
"So do I." Cassiana struggled upright, got to her feet, and walked, with heavy 
deliberation, toward Beth. As she approached, Beth felt a sort of echo of the 
soothing vibration, and the pain slackened somewhat. Cassiana sat down on the 
edge of the shelf, and said quietly, "We are not out of danger. There is still 
to be - " she paused, seeking a word, and finally used the Galactic standard 
term, "still to be allergic reaction. We have to stay close together - in same 
kinetic field -  days till the reaction is desensitized, and our body develop 
tolerance to the grafted - " she stopped and said sharply in Centaurian, "I have 
told you you must not ask me questions! You want your baby to live, don't you? 
Then just do as I say! I - I am sorry, Beth - I do not mean to be angry, I do 
not feel very well either."
Beth knew already that Cassiana never exaggerated, but even knowing this she had 
not expected the vio­lence of the next few hours. After they reached the 
Archonate, the world seemed to dissolve around her in a burning fever, a nausea 
and pain that made her previous illness seem like comfort by comparison. 
Cassiana, deathly pale, her hands as hot as Beth's own, did not leave her for an 
instant. They seemed unable to remain apart for an instant. When they were very 
close together, Beth felt a brief echo of the miasmic vibration which had eased 
her in the room of the machines; but at best this was faint, and when Cas­siana 
drew away from her, by even a few feet, a vague, all - over trembling began in 
every nerve of her body, and the spasms of sickness were aggravated unbearably. 
The critical distance seemed about twelve feet; at that distance, the pain was 
almost intolerable. For hours, Beth was too miserable to notice, but it finally 
dawned on her that Cassiana was actually shar­ing this same torture. She clung 
to Beth in a kind of dread. Had they been less ill, Beth thought, they might 
have found it funny. It was a little like having a Siamese twin. But it was not 
funny at all. It was a grim business, urgent as survival.
They slept that night on the narrow cots pushed close together. Half a dozen 
tunes in her fitful sleep Beth woke to find Cassiana's hand nestled into hers, 
or the rhu'ad girl's arm flung over her shoulder. Once, in a moment of intimacy, 
she asked, "Do all women suffer like this - here?"
Cassiana sat up, and pushed back her long pale hair. Her smile was wry and the 
drawn face, in the flicker of lurid lightning that leaped and danced through the 
shutters, looked bitter and almost old. "No, or I fear there would be few 
children. Although, I'm told, when Megaera was first colonized, it was pretty 
bad. More than half the - the normal women, died. But we found out that 
sometimes a normal woman could go through a pregnancy, if she was kept close to 
a rhu'ad con­stantly. I mean constantly. Almost from the minute of conception, 
she had to stay close to the rhu'ad who was helping her. It was confining for 
both of them. If they didn't like each other to start with - " suddenly, softly, 
Cassiana chuckled. "You can imagine, the way you used to feel about me!"
"Oh, Cassiana, dear - " Beth begged.
Cassiana went on laughing. "When they didn't hate us, they worshiped us, and 
that was worse. But now -  well, a woman will have a little discomfort - 
incon­venience - you saw Nethle. But you - if I had not taken you to the kail' 
rhu'ad when I did, you would have died very soon. As it was I delayed almost too 
long, but I had to wait, because my child was not - "
"Cassiana," Beth asked her in sudden understand­ing, "are you going to have a 
baby too?"
"Of course," Cassiana said impatiently. "How could I help you if I wasn't?"
"You said, rhu'ad don't - "
"They don't usually, it's a waste of time," said Cassiana unguardedly. "Married 
rhu'ad are not al­lowed to go through a pregnancy, for now, during all the six 
cycles of my pregnancy and two more while I recover, no woman in our family 
group can have a child" - suddenly her anger came back and closed down like a 
black cloud between their brief intimacy. "Why do you torment me with 
questions?" she flung furi­ously at Beth. "You know I mustn't answer them! Just 
let me alone, let me alone, let me alone!"
She threw up her arm over her eyes, turned on her side and lay without speaking, 
her back to Beth; but the other, sinking into a restless doze, heard through
her light sleep the sound of stifled crying . . . Beth thought it was the next 
day - she had lost consciousness of time - when she started out of sleep with 
the vague, all - over pain that told her Cassiana was not close to her. Voices 
filtered through a closed door; Cassiana's voice, muted and protesting, and 
Wilidh's high childish treble.
"... but to suffer so, Cassiana, and for her! Why?"
"Perhaps because I was tired of being a freak!"
"Freak?" Wilidh cried, incredulous. "Is that what you call it?"
"Wilidh, you're only a child," Cassiana's voice sounded inexpressibly tender. 
"If you were what I am, you would know just how much we hate it. Wilidh -  since 
I was younger than you, I have had the burden of four families on my head. In 
all my life, am I not to do one thing, just one, because I myself wished for it? 
You have had children of your own. Can't you try to understand me?"
"You have Arli- " Wilidh muttered, sulky.
"She isn't mine - not as Lassa and the twins are yours. Do you know what it's 
like to carry a child - to watch it die - " Cassiana's voice broke. The voices 
sank, were indistinct - then there was a sudden sound like a slap, and Cassiana 
cried out furiously, "Wilidh, tell me what Nethle has done! I'm not asking you, 
I am ordering you to tell - "
Beth heard Wilidh stammering something - then there was a stifled scream, a 
wailing sound, and Cassiana, her face drained of color, pushed the door and came 
with groping steps to Beth's side. "Beth - wake up!"
"I'm awake - what's happened, Cassiana?"
"Nethle - false friend, false sister - " Cassiana's voice failed her. Her mouth 
moved, but no words came. She looked ghastly, sick and worn, and she had to 
support herself with one hand against the frame of Beth's cot. "Listen - there 
are - Terrans here, looking for you. They are looking for you - days now - your 
husband could not lie well enough, and Nethle told - " she clutched at Beth's 
hand. "You cannot leave here now. We might both die - " she stopped, her face 
gone impassive. There was a knock on the door.
Beth lay quiet, her eyes burning, as the door swung wide. Cassiana, a stony, 
statue - still figure of offended tradition, stared coldly at the two intruders 
who crossed the threshold. In 600 years no man had penetrated these apartments. 
The Terrans stood ill at ease, know­ing they violated every tradition, law, 
custom of the planet.
"Matt!" Beth whispered, not believing.
In two strides he was beside her, but she drew away from his arms. "Matt, you 
promised!" she said un­steadily.
"Honey, honey - " Matt moaned. "What have they done to you here?" He looked 
down, tormented, at her thinner cheeks, and touched her forehead with 
disbelieving dismay. "Good God, Dr. Bonner, she's burning with fever!" He 
straightened and whirled on the other. "Let's get her out of here, and talk 
after­ward. She belongs in a hospital!"
The doctor thrust the protesting Cassiana uncere­moniously aside. "I'll deal 
with you later, young woman," he said between his teeth. He bent profes­sionally 
over Beth; after a moment he turned on Cassiana again. "If this girl dies," he 
said slowly, "I will hold you personally responsible for denying her competent 
medical attention. I happen to know she hasn't been near any practitioner on the 
planet. If she dies, I will haul you into court if I have to take it to Galactic 
Center on Rigel!"
Beth pushed Matt's hand away. "Please - " she begged. "You don't realize - 
Cassiana's been good to me, she's tried to -  she sat up, clutching her night 
robe - one of Nethle's a little too small for her - about her bare shoulders. 
"If it hadn't been for her - "
"Then why all this secrecy?" the doctor asked curtly. He thrust a message 
capsule into Cassiana's hands. "Here. This will settle it." Like a sleepwalker, 
Cassiana opened it, drew out the slip of flexible plastic, stared, shrugged and 
tossed it to Beth. Incredulous, Beth Ferguson read the legal words. Under the 
nominal law of the Terran Empire, they could be enforced. But this - to the wife 
of the Chief Archon of Megaera -  she opened her mouth in silent indignation.
Matt said quietly, "Get dressed, Betty. I'm taking you to the hospital. No - " 
he checked her protest, "don't say a word. You aren't capable of making 
decisions for yourself. If Cassiana meant you any good, there wouldn't be all 
this business of hiding you."
Cassiana caught Beth's free hand tight. She looked desperate - trapped. "Leave 
her with me for three days," she made a final appeal. "She'll die if you take 
her away now!"
Dr. Bonner said tersely, "If you can give me a full explanation of that 
statement, I'll consider it. I'm a medical man. I think I'm a reasonable man." 
Cassiana only shook her head silently. Beth blinked hard, al­most crying, 
"Cassiana! Can't you tell them - "
"Leave her with me for three days - and I'll try to get permission to tell you - 
" Cassiana begged help­lessly. Before her despairing eyes, Matt lowered his own. 
"Look, Doc, we could be making a big mistake - "
"We're only delaying," the doctor said tersely. "Come on, Mrs. Ferguson, get 
dressed. We're taking you to Medical HQ. If we find that this - this delay 
hasn't really hurt you any - " he turned and glared at Cassiana, "then maybe 
we'll do some apologizing. But unless you can explain - "
Cassiana said bitterly, "I am sorry, Beth. If I were to tell now, without 
permission, I would not live till sunset. And neither would anyone who heard 
what I said."
"Are you threatening us?" Matt asked ominously.
"Not at all. Only stating a fact." Cassiana's eyes held cold contempt.
Beth was sobbing helplessly. Dr. Bonner rasped, "Pull yourself together! You'll 
go, or be carried. You're a sick girl, Mrs. Ferguson, and you'll do as you're 
told."
Cassiana said softly, "Leave her alone with me for just a few minutes, at least, 
while I get her dressed - "
Matt started to leave the room, but the doctor put a hand on his shoulder. "Stay 
with your wife. Or I will."
"Never mind," said Beth wearily, and began to get out of bed. Cassiana hovered 
near her, not speaking, her face sick with despair, while the Earth - woman 
managed to dress herself after a fashion. But as Beth, still protesting 
helplessly, leaned on Matt, Cassiana sud­denly found her voice.
"You will do justice to remember," she said, very low, "that I have warned you. 
When there come thing which you do not understand, remember. Beth - " she looked 
up imploringly, then without warning she broke down and collapsed, a limp rag, 
on the tumbled bed. The servant women, spitting Centaurian curses, has­tened to 
her. Beth struggled to free Matt's hands, but the two men carried her from the 
room.
It was like dying. It was like being physically pulled into pieces. Beth clawed 
and fought, knowing in some subconscious, instinctive way that she was fighting 
for her life, feeling strength dram out of her, second by second. The world 
dissolved in red fog, and she slumped down fainting in her husband's arms.
Time and delirium passed over her head. The white sterile smells of the Medical 
HQ surrounded her, and the screens around her bed bounded her sight except when 
Matt or a puzzled doctor bent over her. She was drugged, but through the 
sedatives there was pain and a fearful sickness and she cried and begged Matt 
inco­herently, "Cassiana - I had to be near her, can't you understand - " and 
Matt only patted her hand and whispered gentle words. She dived down deep into 
delirium again, feeling her body burning, while faces, familiar and strange, 
multiplied around her, and once she heard Matt shouting in a voice that cracked 
like a boy's, "Damn it, she's worse than she was when we found her, do 
something, can't any of you do anything?"
Beth knew she was dying, and the idea seemed pleasant. Then quite suddenly, she 
came up to the surface of her fogged dreams to see the pallid stern face of a 
rhu'ad above her. Beth's eyes and brain cleared simultaneously. The room was 
otherwise empty. Pinkish sunlight and a cool, pungent breeze filled the white 
spaces, and the rhu'ad's face was colorless and alien but full of re­served 
friendliness. Not only the room but the whole building seemed oddly silent; no 
distant voices, no hurrying footsteps, nothing but the distant hum of sky - cabs 
outside the windows, and the faint rustle of the ventilators. Beth felt a sort 
of drowsy, lazy comfort. She smiled, and said without surprise, "Cassiana sent 
you."
The rhu'ad murmured, "Yes. She nearly died too, you know. Your Terrans are - " 
she used a word which did not appear in Megaerean dictionaries " - but she did 
not forget you. I have done a fearful thing, so you must promise not to tell 
anyone that I've been here. I brought a damper into the building and hypnotized 
all the nurses on this floor. I've got to leave before they wake up. But you 
will get well now."
Beth pleaded, "Why is this secrecy so necessary? Why can't you just tell them 
what you've done? I know they didn't think I'd live, the fact that I feel better 
should be enough proof!"
"They would try to make me tell them, and then they would not believe me. After 
they see your baby, they will believe it. Then we will tell them."
Beth asked her, "Who are you?"
The rhu'ad smiled faintly and mentioned the name of one of the most important 
men of Megaera. Her eyes twinkled at Beth's astonishment. "They sent me rather 
than an unknown - in the event I am found here, your Terrans might hesitate to 
cause an international incident. But just the same I don't intend to let them 
see me."
"But what was the matter with me?"
"You developed an allergy to the baby. Alien tissue -  blood types that didn't 
mix - but you'll be all right now. I haven't time to explain it," the rhu'ad 
finished impatiently and turned, without another word, and hurried out of the 
room. Beth felt free and light, her body in comfort, with­out a trace of 
sickness or pain. She lay back on her pillows, smiling, feeling the faint stir 
and quickening of the child within her, then adjusted the smile to the proper 
angle as a nurse - one of Dr. Bonner's hard - faced old Darkovan assistants - 
tiptoed in, her face sheepish, and peered round the corner of the screen. Beth 
had to force back a spontaneous laugh at the change which came over the old 
lady's face as she gasped, "Oh - Mrs. Ferguson - you - you do look bet­ter this 
morning, don't you? I - I - I think Dr. Bonner had better have a look at you - " 
and she turned and actually ran out of the cubicle.
"But what did they do to you? Surely you must know what they did to you," Dr. 
Bonner protested tiredly for the hundredth time. "Just tell me what you 
remember. Even if it doesn't make sense to you."
Beth felt sorry for the old man's puzzlement. It couldn't be pleasant for him, 
to admit he'd failed. She said gently, "I've told you everything." She paused, 
trying to put it into words he could accept; she had tried to tell him about the 
manner in which Cassiana's physical presence had soothed her, but he had 
shrugged it off angrily as delirium.
"This place where they took you. Where was it?"
"I don't know. Cassiana blindfolded me." She paused again. From prolonged mental 
contact with Cassiana, she had come from the kail' rhu'ad with a subdued sense 
of having taken part in a religious ritual, but it meant nothing to her as 
religion, and she could only give incoherent scraps of her impressions. "A big 
domed room - and a room full of machines - " at his request, she described the 
machines in as much detail as she could remember, but he shook his head. Trying 
to help, she ventured, "Cassiana called one of them a telepathic damper - "
"Are you sure? Those things are made on Darkover, and their export is generally 
discouraged - even the Darkovans won't talk about them very much. The
other thing could have been a Howell C-5 Electro-psychometer. It must have been 
a special hopped - up model, though, if it could put your cell waves into phase 
with a telepath's!" His eyes were thoughtful. "I wonder what they did that for? 
It must have hurt like hell!"
"Oh, no!" Beth tried to explain just how it had felt, but he only shrugged and 
looked dissatisfied again. "When I examined you," he told her, and glanced side 
- wise at Matt, "I found an Incision, about four inches long, in the upper right 
groin. It was almost healed over, and they'd pulled it together with a cosmetic 
lac­quer - even under a magnifying glass, it was hard to see."
Beth said, struggling for a dim memory, "Just as I was going under the 
anesthetic, one of the rhu'ad said something. It must have been a technical 
term, be­cause I didn't understand it. Aghmara kedulhi varrha. Does that mean 
anything to you, Dr. Bonner?"
The man's white head moved slightly. "The words mean, placenta graft. Placenta 
graft," he repeated, slowly. "Are you absolutely certain those were the words?"
"Positive."
"But that doesn't make sense, Mrs. Ferguson. Even a partial detachment of the 
human placenta would have caused miscarriage."
"I definitely haven't miscarried!" Beth laughed, pat­ting her swollen body.
The old man smiled with her. "Thank God for that!" he said sincerely. But his 
voice was troubled. "I wish I was sure of those words."
Beth hesitated, "Maybe it was - Aghmarda kedul - hiarra va?"
Bonner shook his head, almost smiling. "Kedulhi -  placenta - is bad enough," he 
said. "Kedulhiarra - who ever heard of grafting a baby? No, you must have had it 
right the first time, I guess. Maybe they grafted, subcutaneously, some kind of 
placental tissue from a Centaurian. That would even explain the allergy. 
Pos­sibly, Mrs. Jeth - san acted as the donor?"
"Then why did she have the allergy too?" Beth asked. Dr. Bonnet's heavy 
shoulders lifted and dropped. "God knows. All I can say is that you're a lucky, 
lucky girl, Mrs. Ferguson." He looked at her in unconcealed wonder, then turned 
to Matt. "You might as well take your wife home, Legate. She's perfectly all 
right. I've never seen a Terran woman look so healthy on Megaera. But stay close 
to home," he advised her. "I'll come over and have a look at you now and then. 
There must be some reason why the Centaurians go into seclusion. We'll try it 
with you - no sense in tak­ing chances."
But Beth's sickness did not return. Contentedly se­cluded in the Residence, as 
snugly celled as a bee in her hive, she made tranquil preparations for the birth 
of her child. Nature has a sort of anesthesia for the pregnant woman; it 
smoothed Beth's faint disquiet about Cassiana. Matt was tender with her, 
refusing to discuss his work, but Beth detected lines of strain in his face and 
voice, and after a month of this she asked him pointblank, "Is something wrong, 
Matt?"
Matt hesitated - then exploded. "Everything's gone wrong! Your friend Cassiana 
has really messed us up properly with Rai Jeth - san! I'd counted on his 
cooper­ation, but now - " he gave a despondent shrug. "He just says, in that 
damned effeminate voice of his," Matt's husky baritone rose to a thin mocking 
echo of the Archon's accent, "peaceful settlement is what we want. Terran 
colonists with their wives and children we will accept, but on Megaera we will 
not accept floods of unmarried and unattached personnel to dis­turb the balance 
of our civilization." Matt made a furious gesture. "He knows Terrans can't bring 
their women here! The hell with this place, Betty - space station and all! They 
can blow the planet into the Milky Way, for all I care! As soon as Junior is 
born, and you're clear for space, I'm going to throw this job right in the 
Empire's face! I'll take a secretaryship somewhere - we'll probably have to go 
out on the fringe of the Galaxy - but at least I've got you!" He bent down to 
kiss his wife. "It serves me right for bringing you here in the first place!"
Beth hugged him, but she said in a distressed tone, "Matt, Cassiana saved my 
life! I simply can't believe that she'd turn the Archon against you. We don't 
deserve what Cassiana did for me - the Empire's been treating Megaera like a 
piece of lost - and - found pro­perty!"
Matt laughed, guilty. "Are you going in for politics?"
Beth said hotly, "You have authority to make recom­mendations, don't you? Why 
not, once, just once, do what's fair, instead of what the diplomatic manual 
recommends? You know that if you resign now, Terra will close out the Legation 
here, and put Megaera under martial law as a slave state! I know, the official 
term is protectorate - satellite, but it means the same thing! Why don't you 
make a formal recommendation that Megaera be given dominion status, as an 
indepen­dent, affiliated government?"
Matt began, "To achieve that distinction, a planet has to make some important 
contribution to Galactic Civilization - "
"Oh, comet dust!" Beth snapped. "The fact of their survival proves that their 
science is ahead of ours!"
Matt said dubiously, "The Empire might agree to an independent buffer state in 
this end of the Galaxy. But they've been hostile to the Empire . "
"They sent a petition to Terra, 600 years ago," Beth said quietly. "Their women 
died by thousands while the petition was being pigeonholed. I think they'd die 
all over again before they asked anything of Terra. It's Terra's turn to offer 
something. The Empire owes them something! Independence and affiliation - "
"Cassiana's certainly got you sold on Megaeran pol­itics," Matt said sourly.
"Politics be damned!" Beth said with such heat that her husband stared. "Can't 
you see what it means, idiot - what Cassiana did? It proves that Terran women 
can come here in safety! It means that we can send colonists here for peaceful 
settlement! Can't you see, you half - wit, that's the opening Rai Jeth - san was 
leav­ing for you? Cassiana's proved a concession on their side - it's up to 
Terra to make the next move!"
Matt stared at her in blank surprise.
"I hadn't thought of it that way. But, honey, I believe you're right! I'll put 
through the recommenda­tion, anyway. The planet's almost a dead loss now, things 
couldn't be worse. We've nothing to lose - and we might gain a good deal."
Beth's baby was born at the Residence - the Medi­cal HQ did not have maternity 
ward facilities, and Dr. Bonner thought Beth would be more comfortable at home - 
on the first day of the brief Megaeran winter. She came, alert and awake, out of 
a brief induced sleep, and asked the usual questions.
"It's a girl." Mr. Bonner's lined old face looked tired and almost angry. "A 
little over three pounds, in this gravity. Try to rest, Mrs. Ferguson."
"But is she - is she all right?" Beth caught weakly at his hand. "Please tell me 
- please, please let me see her - "
"She's - she's - " the old doctor stumbled over a word, and Beth saw him blink 
hard. "She's - we're giving her oxygen. She's perfectly all right, it's just a 
precaution. Go to sleep, like a good girl. You can see her when you wake up." 
Abruptly, he turned his back and walked away.
Beth struggled against the lassitude that forced her head back. "Dr. Bonner - 
please - " she called after him weakly. The nurse bent over and there was the 
sharp prick of a needle in her arm. "Go to sleep, now, Mrs. Ferguson. Your 
baby's all right. Can't you hear her squalling?"
Beth sobbed, "What's the matter with him? Is there something wrong with my 
baby?" The nurse could not hold her back. Before her fierce maternity the old 
woman hesitated, then turned and crossed the room. "All right, I guess one look 
won't hurt you. You'll sleep better if you've seen her." She picked up something 
and came back to the bed. Beth reached out hungrily, and after a minute, smiling 
faintly, the Darkovan woman put the baby down on the bed be­side Beth.
"Here. You can hold her for a minute. The men don't understand, do they?"
Beth smiled happily, folding back the square of blanket that lay lapped over the 
small face. Then her mouth fell open and she uttered a sharp cry.
"This isn't my baby! It's not - she isn't, you don't - " her eyes blurred with 
panicky tears. Rebelliously, scared, she looked down in terror at the baby she 
held.
The infant was not red or wrinkled. The smooth soft new skin was white - a 
shining, lustrous, pearly white. The tight - screwed eyes were a slaty silver, 
and a pallid, gilt - colored down already curled faintly on the little round 
head.
Perfect. Healthy. But - a rhu'ad.
The nurse dived for the baby as Beth fainted.
It was nearly a month before Beth was strong enough to get up during the day. 
Shock had played vicious havoc to her nerves, and she was very ill indeed. Her 
mind acquiesced, and she loved her small perfect daugh­ter, but the unconscious 
conflict forced itself inward, and took revenge on every nerve of her body. The 
experience had left a hidden wound, too raw to touch. She sheltered herself 
behind her weakness.
The baby - over Mart's protest, Beth had insisted on calling the child Cassy - 
was more than a month old when one afternoon her Centaurian servant came into 
her room and announced, "The Archon's wife has come to visit you, Mrs. Legate 
Furr - ga - soon."
Beth had forced the memory so deep that she only thought that Nethle or Wilidh 
had come to pay a formal call. She sighed and stood up, sliding her bare feet 
into scuffs, and padding across to her dressing panel. She twisted buttons, 
playing out lengths of bil­lowing nylene to cover her short indoor chemise, and 
slid her head into the brusher which automatically attended to her short hair. 
"I'll go up. Take Cassy down to the nursery, will you?
The Centaurian girl murmured, "She has her baby -  with her."
Beth stared in stupefaction. No wonder the servant girl had seemed 
thunderstruck. A baby outside its own home, on Megaera?
"Bring her down here, then - " she directed. But that did not dull her surprise 
when a familiar, lightly moving form shrouded in pale robes, ghosted into the 
room.
"Cassiana!" she said tremulously.
The rhu'ad smiled at her affectionately as they clasped hands. Then suddenly 
Beth threw her arms around Cassiana and broke down in a tempest of stormy 
crying.
"Don't, don't - " Cassiana pleaded, but it was use­less. All the suppressed fear 
and shock had broken loose at once, and Cassiana held her, awkwardly, as if 
unused to this kind of emotion, trying to comfort, finally bursting into tears 
herself. When she could speak again steadily, she said, "Can you believe me, 
Beth, if I say I know how you are feeling? Look, you must try to pull yourself 
together, I have promised I'd explain to you - "
She freed herself gently, and from the servant's arms she took a bundle, 
carefully shielded in tough, transparent plastic, with double handles for 
carrying. She opened the package carefully and from the depths of this ingenious 
cradle she lifted a wrapped baby, held it out and put it into Beth's arms.
"This is my little boy - "
Beth finally raised her eyes to Cassiana, who was standing, fascinated, by 
Cassy's crib. "He - he - he looks like - " Beth faltered, and Cassiana nodded. 
"That's right. He is a Terran child. But he's mine. Rather -  he's ours." Her 
earnest eyes rested on the other in something like appeal. "I promised to 
explain - Dhemhari, Beth, don't start to cry again ..." "We rhu'ad would 
probably have been killed, any­where except on Megaera," Cassiana began, a few 
minutes later, when they had settled down together on a cushioned divan, the 
babies snuggled down in pil­lows between them. "Here, we saved the colony. 
Orig­inally, I think, we were a cosmic ray mutation. We were part of the normal 
population then. We hadn't adapted quite so far." She paused. "Do you know what 
Genetic Drift is? In an isolated population, he­reditary characteristics just 
drift away from normal. I mean - suppose a colony had, to begin with, half 
blonde people, and half brunette. In a normal society, it would stay distributed 
like that - about 50 - 50 per cent. But in one generation, just by chance, it 
might vary as far as 60 - 40. In the next generation, it could go back to 
normal, or - the balance once having been changed - it could keep drifting, and 
there would be 70 per cent of blondes and only 30 per cent of brunettes. That's 
oversimplified, of course, but if that keeps up for eight or ten generations, 
with natural selection working hard too, you get a distinct racial type. We had 
two direc­tions of drifting, because we had the normal popula­tion, and - we had 
the rhu'ad. Our normal women were dying - more in every generation. The rhu'ad 
could have children safely, but somehow, we had to preserve the normal type."
She picked up Cassy and snuggled her close. "Did you name her for me, then?" she 
asked. "Well - I started to explain. A rhu'ad is human, and perfectly normal, 
except - they will find it out about Cassy some day - we have, in addition to 
our other organs, a third ovary. And this third ovary is parthenogenetic - self 
- reproducing. We could have perfectly, human, nor­mally sexed children, either 
male or female, who would breed true to the normal human type. They were even 
normally susceptible to the poisonous reaction in this air. These normal 
children were carried, in the normal way, except that a rhu'ad mother was immune 
to the hormone reaction, and could protect a normal child. Or, a rhu'ad woman 
could, from the third ovary, at her own will - we have control over all our 
reflexes, including conception - have a rhu'ad, female child. Any rhu'ad can 
reproduce, duplicate herself, without male fertilization. I never had a father. 
No rhu'ad does."
"Is Cassy - "
Cassiana paid no attention to the interruption. "But the mutation is female. 
While the normal women were dying, and only the rhu'ad could have children - 
even these children died when they grew up - we were afraid that in three or 
four generations we would end with an all - female, parthenogenetic, all - 
rhu'ad society. No one wanted that. Least of all the rhu'ads themselves." She 
paused. "We have all the instincts of normal women. I can have a child without 
male fertilization," she looked searchingly at Beth, "but that does not change 
the fact that I - I love my husband and I want his children -  like any other 
woman. Perhaps more - being telepathic. That's an emotional problem, too. We 
have done our part for Megaera, but we - we want to be women. Not sexless 
freaks!"
She paused again, then continued, evidently search­ing for words. "The rhu'ad 
are almost completely adapt­able. We tried implanting rhu'ad gametes - ova - 
from our normal ovaries, into normal women. It didn't work, so finally they 
evolved the system we have today. A rhu'ad becomes pregnant in the normal way - 
" for the first time Beth saw her blush slightly, "and carries her child for 
two, maybe three months. By that time, the unborn child builds up a temporary 
immunity against the toxins released by the hormone allergy. Then they transfer 
this two - month embryo into the host mother's womb. The immunity lasts long. 
enough that the baby can be carried to full term, and birthed. Then, of course, 
there's no more danger at all, for a male child - or, for a female child, no 
more danger until she grows up and herself becomes pregnant.
"Another thing: After a woman has her first child like that, she also builds up 
a very slight immunity to the hormone reaction. For a woman's second child, or 
third, or more, it is sufficient to transplant a fertilized ovum of six or seven 
days . . . provided that there is a rhu'ad within immediate call, to stabilize 
the chemistry in case anything goes wrong. One or more of my families always has 
a woman who is pregnant, so I must be continuously available."
"Isn't that terribly hard on you?" Beth asked.
"Physically, no. We've done what they do with prize cattle all over the Empire - 
hyperovulation. At certain days in each cycle, rhu'ads are given particular 
hormone and vitamin substances, so that we release not one ovum, but somewhere 
between four and twelve. Usually they can be transferred about a week later, and 
the operation is almost painless - "
"Then all the children in your four - families, are yours, and your husband's?"
"Why, no! Children belong to the woman who bears them and gives birth to them - 
and to the man who loves that woman, and mates with her!" Cassiana laughed. "Oh, 
I suppose all societies adapt their mor­als to their needs. To me, it's a little 
- nasty, for a man to have just one wife, and live with her all year. And aren't 
you terribly lonely, with no other women in your house?"
It was Beth's turn to blush. Then she asked, "But you said those were normal 
children. Cassy - Cassy is a rhu'ad - "
"Oh yes. I couldn't do with you what I' - d have done with a Centaurian. You had 
no resistance at all, and you were already pregnant. Women do become preg­nant 
sometimes, in the ordinary way, on Megaera - we are strict about contraceptive 
laws, but nothing is en­tirely reliable - and when they do, they die, unless a 
rhu'ad will take for them the risk I took for you. I had done it once before, 
for Clotine, but the baby I had died - well, during those three days while you 
were shut up alone, I went to the kail' rhu'ad, and put myself under a damper - 
and became pregnant. By myself."
A thousand tiny hints were suddenly falling into place in Beth's mind. "Then you 
did graft - "
Cassiana nodded. "That's right. When we went to­gether to the kail' rhu'ad, the 
dampers put us into phase - so the cellular wave lengths wouldn't vary enough to 
throw the babies into shock - and just ex­changed the babies."
Beth had been expecting this; but even so, Cassiana's casual tone was a shock. 
"You really - "
"Yes. My little boy is - by heredity alone - your child and the Legate's. But he 
is mine. He lived because I - being rhu'ad - could carry him in safety, and 
man­age to stabilize his reactions to the hormone allergy with the atmosphere. 
There was no question of Cassy's safety: a rhu'ad baby, even a rhu'ad embryo, is 
per­fectly adaptable, even to the alien environment of a Terran body. The first 
few days were so crucial be­cause you and I both developed allergies to the 
grafted alien tissue; our bodies were fighting the introduction of a foreign 
kind of substance. But once we mother - hosts began to develop a tolerance, I 
could stabilize myself, and my little boy, and you - and when you were taken 
from me too soon, I could send another rhu'ad to complete the stabilization. 
There was no need to worry about Cassy; she simply adapted to the poisonous 
condition which would have killed a normal child."
She picked up Cassy and rocked her almost wistfully. "You have a most unusual 
little daughter, Beth. A perfect little parasite."
Beth looked down at Cassiana's little boy. Yes, she could trace in his face a 
faint likeness to the lines of Mart's, and yet - hers? No. Cassy was hers, borne 
in her body - she wanted to cry again.
Cassiana leaned over and put an arm around her. "Beth," she said quietly, "I 
have just come from the Legation HQ, where - with full permission of the 
Coun­cil of Rhu'ad - I have laid before them a complete, scientific account of 
the affair. I have also been al­lowed to assure the Terran authorities that when 
Ter­ran colonists come here to build the Space Station, their women will be 
safe. We have suggested that colonists be limited to families who have already 
had children, but we will give assurance that an accidental pregnancy need not 
be disastrous. In return I received assurance, forwarded from Galactic Center, 
that Megaera will receive full dominion status as an independent planetary 
government associated with the Empire. And we are being opened to colonization."
"Oh, how wonderful!" Beth cried impulsively. Then doubt crept into her voice. 
"But so many of your people hate us - "
The rhu'ad smiled. "Wait until your women come. Unattached men, on Megaera, 
could only make trou­ble. Men have so many different basic drives! An Empire man 
from Terra is nothing like a Centaurian from Megaera, and a Darkovan from 
Thendara is different from either - take ten men from ten different planets, and 
you have ten different basic drives - so different that they can only lead to 
war and ruin. But women - all through the Galaxy, Terran, Darkovan, Samarran, 
Centaurian, Rigelian - women are all alike, or at least they have a common basic 
area. A baby is the passport to the one big sorority of the universe. And 
admission is free to every woman in the Galaxy. We'll get along."
Beth asked numbly, "And you were convinced enough of that to risk your life for 
a Terran who -  hated you? I'm ashamed, Cassiana."
"It wasn't entirely for you," Cassiana admitted. "You and your husband were 
Megaera's first and last chance to avoid being a backwater of the Galaxy. I 
planned this from the minute I first saw you. I - I wasn't your friend, either, 
at first."
"You - you couldn't have known I'd get pregnant - "
Cassiana looked shamed and embarrassed. "Beth I - I planned it, just as it 
happened. I'm a telepath. It was my mental command that made you stop taking 
your anti shots."
Beth felt a sudden surge of anger so great that she could not look at Cassiana. 
She had been manipulated like a puppet - She felt the rhu'ad's thin hand on her 
wrist. "No. Only a fortuitous accident in the way of destiny. Beth, look at them 
- " Her free hand touched the two ba­bies, who had fallen asleep, cuddled like 
two little animals. "They are sister and brother, in more than one way. And 
perhaps you will have other children. You belong to us, now Beth."
"My husband - "
"Men will adapt to anything, if their women accept it," Cassiana told her. "And 
your daughter is a rhu'ad -  who will grow up in a Terran home. There will be 
others like her. In her turn she will help the daughters of Terran families who 
come here, until science finds a new way and each woman can bear her own 
children again - or until Centaurians take their place, moving out into the 
Galaxy with the rest - "
And Beth knew in her heart that Cassiana was right.
(1954)
 
 
The Climbing Wave
 
Brian Kearns knew to the second, by his ship - time chronometer and by the 
faint, almost imperceptible humming of a monitor screen, when the limit of 
grav­ity tolerance was reached. Giving himself a round ten seconds for safety 
margin - Brian was a practical and methodical young man, and had spent twelve 
years training for this work and four and a half years doing it - he unfastened 
the straps on his skyhook, the free - swinging, nest - like lounge cradle where 
he had been lying with ears and eyes fastened on the complex con­trols. He 
inched patiently, fly - like, down the wall, braced himself to a handhold, and 
threw a certain switch to the farthest position leftward.
The barely perceptible humming stopped.
Brian Kearns had just put himself out of a job.
He picked up the stylus chained to the logbook, held a floating page down with 
his right hand, and wrote swiftly and expertly with his left:
"1676th day of voyage; have just thrown switch which cut the interstellar 
drives. Our calculations were correct and there appear to have been no visible 
shock effects as the IS units went out of function. We are now standing fourteen 
hundred miles off Mars. Relin­quished control of ship at - " he glanced at the 
chro­nometer again, and wrote " - 0814 hours. Position . . ." He added a series 
of complicated numerals, scribbled his initials beneath his entry, then picked 
up the hook of the intercabin communicator and waggled it.
A dim rasping voice said from the other end of the starship, almost half a mile 
away, "That you, Kearns?"
"Right, Caldwell."
"We're standing by with atomics back here, Brian. Were the figures right?"
"All calculations appear to have been correct," Brian answered stiffly. "The 
drives have been cut according to the schedule previously worked out."
"Yippee!" the voice shouted from the loudspeaker, and Brian frowned and coughed 
reprovingly. The far­away voice appeared to be stifling an expletive, but 
inquired correctly: "Standing by for orders, Captain Kearns?"
"All right, Captain Caldwell," Brian said; "she's your ship, as of - " he 
stopped, glanced at the chro­nometer again, and after a few seconds said, "now!"
He put down the hook, and looked around the main control room, in which he had 
spent the best part of the Homeward1?, long voyage. The tremendous inter­stellar 
drives were silent now, their dim hum stilled, and the metal surfaces faced him 
with a blank, metal­lic unresponsiveness. Brian had a curious feeling of 
anticlimax while he recapped the stylus, slid a moving panel over the logbook, 
and clung there to the hand­hold, wondering with the back part of his mind if he 
had left anything undone, while knowing, with the sureness of long habit, that 
he had not.
It is impossible to shrug one's shoulders in free fall; the motion sends you 
flying across the cabin, and Brian was too well - trained to make waste motions 
of that sort. But his eyebrow lifted a little, and a sort of elated grin spread 
across his face; for a minute, unob­served, he looked almost as young as he was. 
Then, re - schooling his expression to the gravity he always wore in the 
presence of his crew, he inched back across the wall, methodically unstrapped 
his rubber sandals from their place in the skyhook, worked his feet into them 
with the skill of long practice, and, pulling himself swiftly across the 
remaining section of wall, wriggled the forward part of his body through the 
sphincter lock which led to the forward part of the great starship. There he 
paused, his middle clasped firmly by the expanding diaphragm, looking down the 
narrow, cy­lindrical corridor. He could feel, now, the faint vibra­tion all 
around him, as far away in the nose of the Homeward the atomic rockets began 
firing. He al­lowed himself to grin again, this time with the secret contempt of 
a hyperdrive technician for rockets, how­ever necessary, and slowly hauled the 
rest of his long, narrow body through the sphincter; then, pushing his feet hard 
against the diaphragm which had snapped tight behind him, he arrowed down, in a 
straight line, his body rocketing weightless down the corridor. He braked 
himself with strong hands at the far end, then paused; there was a musical 
mewing behind him, and the ship's cat, Einstein - actually a Centaurian mam­mal 
more nearly resembling a dwarf kangaroo - somer­saulted dizzily through the air 
toward him.
"Brian - catch him!" a girl's voice called, and Brian turned, hooking one rubber 
sandal through a strap, and made a wide sweeping grab for the creature. He 
caught it by one spindly leg; it squalled and thrashed to get away, and the girl 
called anxiously "Hang on, I'm coming." She propelled herself down the corridor, 
and hurriedly snatched the little animal, who im­mediately quieted and snuggled 
under her chin.
"He went crazy when the rockets started," she mur­mured apologetically. "It must 
be the vibration or something."
Brian grinned down at the girl, who was small and slight, her curly fair hair 
standing weirdly around her head and her prim brief coverall floating put in odd 
billows. They had all lived at free fall conditions for so long that he barely 
noticed this, but he did see the disquiet in her brown eyes - Ellinor Wade was a 
food culturist, and knew rather less about the drives than the Centaurian cat.
"It's all right, Ellie; maybe Einstein's a hyperdrive technician. I just cut the 
IS units and turned the ship over to Caldwell."
She whispered, "Then we're almost there! Oh, Brian!" and her eyes were a double 
star, first magni­tude. He nodded. "It's Caldwell's command now, so I don't know 
what he'll do," Brian added, "but you'd better keep your ears lapped over for 
instructions. We'll have to strap hi, in a few minutes, for decelera­tion, if 
he's going to brake in at Mars."
"Brian, I'm scared ..." Ellie whispered, and let the Centaurian cat float free, 
fumbling around for his hand. "It would be - hideously ironical, if this old 
ship trav­eled to Centaurus and back, and then cracked up in atmosphere - "
"Relax," Brian advised her genially. "He may de­cide to go on to Earth, anyway - 
Caldwell knows his business, Ellie. And I know the Homeward."
"You certainly do." The girl attempted a smile, which somehow missed its 
purpose. "You're in love with this old wreck!"
Brian grinned disarmingly. "I won't deny it," he an­swered. "But it's just a 
kind of substitute passion till I can get you down to earth!"
The girl blushed and turned her face away from him. The twelve members of the 
Homeward's crew were all young, and the confined quarters aboard gen­erated 
strong attachments; but men and women were carefully segregated aboard ship, for 
an excellent and practical reason which had nothing to do with moral­ity. The 
trip from Centaurus, even at hyperspeeds, took the best part of five years. And 
no one has yet discovered any method for delivering a baby in free fall.
Brian unhooked his rubber shoe. "Going into the lounge?"
"No ..." She hung back. "I've got to feed Ein­stein, after - Paula's still in 
the Food Culture unit, and there's no public address system in there - I'd 
better go and tell her we may have to strap in. Go on ahead, and I'll tell Paula 
- "
"I'll come with you. I'm hungry and I want to snatch a bite before we go out, 
anyhow - "
"No!" The sharpness of her voice amazed him. "Go on out in the lounge, 111 bring 
you something."
He stared at her. "What - "
"Go on. Paula's - Paula's - " Ellie fumbled and fin­ished, " - she's dressing in 
there."
"What the devil -  Brian, suddenly suspicious, shoved hard against the handhold, 
and barreled across the corridor to the open lock of the Food Culture unit. 
Elite gave a wordless cry of warning as Brian fell through the doorway, and in 
the aftermath of that cry, beneath Brian's intrusive stare, two fused figures 
jerked convulsively and thrust apart, Paula Sandoval flung her arms over her 
face and grabbed at a floating garment, while Tom Mellen jackknifed upright and 
glared belligerently at Brian.
"Get the hell out of here!" he roared, simultaneous with Brian's needle - 
voiced, "What's going on in here?"
There was blue vitriol in Paula Sandoval's taut voice. "I think you can see what 
goes on, Captain!" and her black eyes snapped fire at him.
"Brian - " Ellie implored, her hand on his wrist with a gentle, repressive 
force. He threw it off with a violence that flung her halfway across the cabin.
He said, with icy command, "You'd better get up front, Paula. Caldwell will need 
his figures checked. As for you, Mellen, regulations - "
"Regulations go jump in a hot jet, and you too!" Tom Mellen stormed. He was a 
loose - limbed young fellow, well over six feet tall and looking longer. "What 
the hell do you think you're doing anyway, pushing your weight around?"
"Look," Brian said tersely, and jerked around to the girls, "Paula, get up front 
- that's an order! Tom, this part of the ship is off limits for men except at 
regular meal periods. This is the fifth tune - "
"The sixth to be exact, Captain's Log - book, and four times you didn't catch 
me. So what? What the hell are you, a blasted - "
"We'll leave my personal habits out of the matter, Mister Mellen. Sandoval" he 
flung at Paula. "I gave you an order!"
Ellie had her arms around Paula, who was sobbing harshly, but the small dark 
girl pulled away from Ellie, her eyes ablaze. "Give him another one for me, 
Tom," she said bitterly, and scooted out of the cabin. Brian added, more 
quietly, "You go too, Ellie. I'll settle this with Mellen right now."
But Ellie did not move. "Brian," she said quietly, "this is a pretty stupid time 
to be enforcing that regulation."
"As long as the Homeward is in space," Brian said tightly, "that particular 
regulation - and all others based on principles of necessity - will be 
enforced."
"You listen here… " Mellen began furiously, then abruptly, his face suffusing 
with violent color, he flung himself upward at Brian, before Kearns realized 
what was coming. "The atomics are on," he grated. "Which means Caldwell's 
captain! And for three years I've been waiting for this - "
Brian dodged in a queer, jerky gesture, and Mellen hurtled over his head, thrown 
on by the momentum of his own blow. "Brian! Tom!" Ellie begged, diving toward 
them and thrusting her rubber - sandaled feet between the men, but Mellen shoved 
her aside.
"I'm warning you, Ellie, get out of the way - " he panted. Brian started "Look 
here - " then, as Mellen plunged at him again, put out both hands and shoved 
hard.
Momentum met momentum. Brian and Mellen spun apart with such violence that heads 
cracked at oppo­site ends of the Food Culture unit, and Brian, half-stunned, 
dragged himself groggily upright.
Mellen's laughter, wry and ironical, filled the cabin.
"Okay, damn it," he said bitterly. "I suppose there's no use having it out here 
and now. But just wait till I get you down to Earth - "
Brian rubbed his head and blinked dizzily, but his voice was precise, giving no 
hint of the shooting stars that were chasing themselves before his eyes. "By 
that
time," he answered coldly, "there will no longer be occasion for fighting, since 
my command will have terminated."
Mellen tightened his mouth, and Ellie interceded anxiously: "Tom, Brian is 
perfectly right, theoretically -  don't stir up hard feelings now, when we're 
almost home - "
"Yeah, that's right . . ." Tom Mellen suddenly grinned, and his face was good - 
natured. "Hey, Brian now about it? No hard feelings, huh?"
Brian turned away. He said frigidly, "Why should there be hard feelings? It's my 
duty to enforce regula­tions until the Homeward is down."
"God damn - " Mellen muttered under his breath at Brian's rigid back, and even 
Ellie looked troubled. Then Mellen made a useless movement and started toward 
the front of the ship.
"Come on. I expect Caldwell will be wanting us," he said tightly, and propelled 
himself in quick, wrath­ful jerks toward the forward lounge.
 
 
II
 
 
The technique of braking into atmosphere had been perfected a hundred years 
before the old Starward rose from Earth to aim at Centaurus. However, it was new 
to the Homeward's crew, and the tediousness of the process set nerves to 
jittering. Only Brian, strapped into one of the skyhooks in the lounge, was 
really calm, and Ellie, in the cradle next to his, absorbed a little of his calm 
confidence; Brian Kearns had been trained aboard the Homeward for twelve years 
before the trip began.
It had taken four generations for the stranded crew of the original ship, the 
Starward, to repair the hyperdrives smashed in landing, and to wrest from the 
soil of 0 Centauri fourth planet - Terra Two, they called it - enough cerberum 
to take a pilot crew back to earth with news of their success. A hundred and 
thirty years, subjective time. Taking account of the timelags engendered by 
their hyperspeeds, it was entirely possi­ble that four or five hundred years had 
elapsed, objec­tively, on the planet their ancestors had left. Ellie, looking 
across at Brian's calm face, at his mouth that persisted in grinning with some 
personal, individual elation when he thought himself unwatched, wondered if he 
felt no regrets at all. Ellie struggled with a mo­ment of blinding homesickness, 
remembering their last view of the little dark planet spinning around the red 
star. They had left a growing colony of 400 souls, .a world to which they could 
never return, for, after five years of subjective time in hyperspeeds, it was 
entirely possible that everyone they had known on Terra Two had already lived 
out a full lifetime.
But Brian's thoughts were moving forward, not back­ward, and he could not keep 
them to himself.
"I suppose by now they've discovered a better method for braking into 
atmosphere," he mused. "If anybody's watching us, down there, we probably look 
like living fossils - and I suppose we are. In their world, we'll be so obsolete 
that we'll feel like stone - age man!"
"Oh, I don't know," Ellie protested. "People don't change - "
"But civilizations do," Brian insisted. "There was less than a hundred years 
between the first rocket to Luna and the launching of the Starward. That's how 
fast a scientific civilization can move."
"But how can you be sure they've moved along those lines?" Ellie wanted to know.
"Have you ever heard of time - binding?" he asked derisively. "When each 
generation accumulates the knowledge of the one before it, progress is a 
perfectly cumulative, straightforward thing. When the Starward left - "
"Brian - " she began, but he rushed on: "I grant you that man progressed at 
random for thousands of years, but when he acquired the scientific method, it 
was less than a hundred years from jet plane to rocketship. A race which had 
interstellar travel could progress in only one direction. If we wanted to take 
the time, we could sit down with an electronic calculator and add it all up, and 
predict exactly what we'd find down there."
"It seems," Ellie said slowly, "That you're leaving out the human element. The 
crew of the Starward were all scientists, hand - picked for compatibility, and 
the Terra Two colony is probably the nearest thing to a homogeneous society that 
ever existed. You can't make that kind of prediction for a normally popu­lated 
planet."
"The human element - "
"Will you two quit it?" shouted Langdon Forbes angrily from his skyhook. "I'm 
trying not to get spacesick, but Kearns sounding off about progress is about all 
I can take! Does he have to pick a time when we're strapped in, and can't get 
away?"
Brian grumbled something unintelligible and lapsed into morose silence. Ellie 
reached dragging fingers, newly clumsy, toward him, but he pushed the hand away.
A dismal wailing came from beneath Ellie's skyhook; Einstein was getting 
reacquainted with gravity, and didn't like it. Ellie scooped up the miserable 
little animal and held it cuddled tight against her straps. It was silent in the 
lounge; the steady, low vibration of the atomic drives was a sound already so 
deeply em­bedded in their consciousness that they did not think of it as sound 
at all. There was still no feeling of motion, but there was an unpleasant, 
dragging sensa­tion as the enormous starship made its wide braking circles, 
first grazing the atmosphere for a second or two, as it swung elliptically, like 
a crazy comet; then entering atmosphere for a few seconds, then a full minute, 
then a few minutes - coming "down" in slow, careful spirals.
"I hope they've found some way to put artificial gravity in spaceships," Judy 
Keretsky moaned, half - laughing, from the skyhook where she swung, upside down, 
from what was now the ceiling of the lounge. He long, curly hair fell down over 
her head in a thick curtain; she alone of the starship's crew did not keep her 
hair clipped functionally short. She batted futilely at the waving curls as she 
wailed, "Oh, my poor head, I'm getting dizzy up here!"
"You're getting dizzy! What about this poor cat!" Ellie jibed.
"Say, whose idea was it to bring that animal along, anyhow?" someone demanded.
"Very valuable contribution to science," Judy bur­lesqued. "Why didn't you bring 
a pair of them, Ellie!" "Brian wouldn't let her," Marcia van Schreeven jeered, 
with an undertone of bitterness.
Ellie patted Einstein's darkish fur defensively, reminding Marcia in her 
peaceful voice: "Einstein is one of the third gender. When conditions are right, 
he'll reproduce in the first and second."
"Lucky animal," Brian said half - seriously, and Ellie glanced at him with 
unusual shyness as she murmured, "Well, Einstein will be unique on Earth, 
anyhow!"
"You'll see things much weirder than Einstein," Brian said offhandedly. "We've 
only been on one planet, and by now, Earth has probably colonized all the nearer 
stars. The people of Earth will be cosmo­politan in the largest sense - "
"Speaking of Earth," Langdon forcibly headed him off before he could hold forth 
again, "where on the planet are we going to set this thing down?"
"We won't know that till we contact the surface," Judy said irritably, batting 
her hair back. "We have the map the Firsts gave us, but it's unthinkable that 
the old spaceport at Denver would still be in use, and if it is, it would 
probably be so changed that we wouldn't know how to land - and too crowded for 
an IS ship this size."
"You've been listening to Brian," Langdon grinned.
"According to him, it's a wonder we haven't already
bumped into the local rocket for the second galaxy!"
Brian ignored the confusion of technical terms and
answered seriously, "That's why I suggested landing on Mars. There are enough 
desert areas on Mars where we could have landed without any danger of damaging 
urbanized sections. I doubt if the population there is quite so centralized."
"Well, why didn't we?" Marcia queried sharply, and Langdon, frowning, twisted 
his head to her. "We tried to radio them from space," he answered, "but they 
evidently didn't pick up our signals. So Caldwell and Mellen decided to bring us 
in to Earth instead of wasting time braking in at Mars and maybe having to pick 
up again. We haven't enough fuel for more than one landing and pick - up."
"We could certainly have refueled at Mars - " Brian began, but was interrupted 
by an apologetic cough from the loudspeaker in the center of the lounge.
"Hey, Kearns," it said in a puzzled rasp. "Brian Kearns, come on up forward, 
will you? Kearns, please come up to the front control room, if you can."
Brian scowled, and started painfully unbuckling the straps on his skyhook. "Now 
what does Mellen want - " he wondered aloud.
"What's the matter?" Judy squeaked, "Are we in trouble?"
"Oh, hush!" Ellie commanded. "If we are, we'll be told!" She watched, with vague 
disquiet, as Brian crawled over the side of his skyhook and abruptly tumbled two 
feet, not very hard, to the floor. "Weight's on the axis now," he announced 
wryly to no one in particular. "Good thing I wasn't up where Judy is, or I'd 
have broken my neck! Somebody will have to lift her down - "
Judy squeaked again, but Ellie snapped at her: "Just stay where you are until we 
find out what's going on!" and watched, disturbed, as Brian crawled clumsily on 
hands and knees across the wall which lay along the central axis of the starship 
and therefore "down." He pushed at the refractory sphincter lock - it worked 
perfectly only in free fall - and forced his head and shoulders through into the 
forward control room.
Tom Mellen, his short hair bristling upright around his head, twisted around as 
Brian wriggled his shoul­ders through. "We've tried to raise them by FM, AM and 
wavicle," he said, scowling, "but they don't an­swer. Not a sign of a signal. 
What do you think of that, Brian?"
Brian looked deliberately around the cabin. Paula Sandoval, strapped in before 
the navigation instru­ments, hunched her bare, tanned shoulders and re­fused to 
meet his eyes; Caldwell, the gray - haired veteran who had repaired the atomic 
rockets, grinned trucu­lently. Mellen's face was puzzled and defensive.
"I said it off Mars," Brian told them, "and I say it again; we're just wasting 
time trying to raise them with any communication devices aboard. By now, they're 
probably using something so far beyond radio or wavicles that they can't pick us 
up. Their equip­ment would be too fine for our clumsy primitive de­vices to."
"Clumsy primitive - " Caldwell broke off, visibly summoning patience, and Mellen 
interrupted fiercely. "Look, Kearns, there are just so many ways of 
trans­mitting electric impulses."
"The first spacemen said that all fuels had to be chemical or atomic, didn't 
they?" Brian snapped. "And we came on cerberum. The world didn't end when the 
Starward left! You've got to realize that we've been stranded in what amounts to 
a time - warp for five hundred years or so, and we're hopelessly obsolete!"
"Maybe so . . ." Mellen said slowly, and waggled the switch again. Brian 
irritably flipped it shut.
"Why keep fussing with it, Tom? If they'd picked up our signals, they'd have 
answered by now. Have you seen any rockets entering or leaving?"
"Nothing larger than twelve centimeters since we entered the orbit," Mellon told 
him.
Brian frowned. "Where are we, Paula?"
The girl gave him a venomous look, but she glanced at her instruments and 
replied, "Orbiting at forty miles, velocity five point six m.p.s."
Kearns glanced at Caldwell. "You're the captain." "In a limited sense," Caldwell 
said slowly, and re­turned his steady gaze. "That's why I wanted you up here. 
There are two things we can do. We can go down under the cloud layer and maybe 
risk getting shot at - to find a place to set down, or else go on a permanent 
orbit, and send somebody down in the pickup."
"The pickup," Brian decided immediately. "Can you imagine trying to land a ship 
this size without instructions from outside? For all we know, there may be laws 
about landing spaceships. The pickup can set down in a few square yards. Whoever 
goes down can locate a spaceport big enough to handle the Homeward and see about 
getting the necessary permissions."
"You're overlooking one thing." Mellen forced the words out. "Suppose they 
haven't any spaceports!"
"They'd have to have spaceports, Tom," Caldwell protested, "even for 
interplanetary ships." And Brian added, "It's impossible that we'd have been the 
only interstellar ship - "
"That isn't what I mean," Mellen protested. "Surely one of the planets, Mars or 
Earth, would have picked up our signals. Someone must use radio for some­thing, 
even if it's purely local. That is, if there's any­one down there at all!"
Brian snorted laughter. "You mean some kind of end - of - the - world disaster?" 
he asked, elaborately sar­castic, but Mellen took him seriously. "Something like 
that."
"There's one way we can find out," Caldwell inter­rupted, "Do you want to take 
the pickup down, Brian? We won't be using the IS drives again - there's noth­ing 
more you can do aboard."
"I'll go," Brian said shortly, but he could barely conceal his eagerness, and 
even forgot his animosity toward Mellen for a minute. "Shall I take Tom to 
handle the radio?"
Caldwell frowned, and answered half practically and half tactfully, "I'll need 
Tom, and Paula too, to bring the ship down when we're ready. Langdon can handle 
the radio in the pickup. And take a couple of others too; Mellen may or may not 
be right, but I don't think any crew members ought to go down alone until we 
know exactly what we'll find down there."
Caldwell's seriousness made little impression on Brian, but he realized that he 
would need someone to pilot the pickup in any case; his own training had fitted 
him only to handle the complex interstellar drives. And Langdon should, they 
decided, keep the radio at his fingertips, to report instantly to the Homeward 
in case of any unforeseen events.
So it was Ellinor Wade who took the controls of the small jet - driven 
stratoplane which had been designed for ship - to - surface shuttling, and used 
during the final stages of repair on the Homeward. She let the small plane sink 
through the thick clouds, and asked, "Where do we want to set down?"
Langdon bent over the carefully copied map. "Judy's scribbled all over this 
thing," he complained. "But try North America, midwest. That's where the first 
rocket ranges were built, and we all speak English, after a fashion."
"Unless the language has changed too much," Brian murmured. Ellie frowned as she 
brought the swift little jet down, arcing across an unfamiliar land - mass; 
Brian and Langdon squeezed their hands to their eyes as the clouds thinned, for 
the sudden blaze of yellow light was like a stab in the eyeballs. Lighting 
aboard ship, of course, was keyed to the familiar crimson noon of Terra Two, 
under which the crew had lived all their lives. Ellie squinted over the 
instrument panel, using an unladylike word under her breath.
The ship dived over rolling hills, and Brian let out his breath slowly as the 
serried regular skyline of mas­sive buildings cleaved the horizon, and said in 
an edgy voice, "I was beginning to wonder if Mellen had been right about those 
atomic deserts!"
Ellie warned, "From what the Firsts have told us, I don't care to get tangled up 
in a city airport! Let's find an open space and set down there." She headed 
northward from the city, and asked, "Have either of you seen anything that looks 
like transportation? Planes, rockets, anything on the ground?"
"Nothing at all with the naked eye," Langdon frowned, "and nothing moving that 
beeps the radar. And I've been watching pretty close."
"Funny ..." Ellie murmured.
From this height everything was clear, and as they swerved groundward, details 
became sharply incised in miniature: wide plowed fields, scattered, toy - like 
houses, clusters of small buildings. There seemed to be ani­mals in the fields. 
Langdon smiled. "Just like home," he said happily, meaning Terra Two. "Regular 
rural community, except that everything looks green/"
"That's this ridiculous yellow light!" Ellie said, ab­sently, and Brian scoffed, 
"Just like home! Better get set for a shock, Langdon!"
"It might be you that gets the shock," Langdon answered unexpectedly, and peered 
over Ellie's shoul­der at the controls. "The ground's level here, Ellie."
The pickup bumped ground and rolled gently; Langdon's fingers moved delicately 
on the radio panel, and he made a brief report in staccato speech while Brian 
unsealed the door. Strange smells wafted in to the cabin, and the three crowded 
together in the en­trance, eyes squinted against the stabbing light, strangely 
reluctant, at the last, to set foot on the unfamiliar soil.
"It's cold . . ." Ellie shivered in her thin garment.
Langdon looked down, dismayed. "You've set down in somebody's grainfield!" he 
reproached. Food was still conserved carefully on Terra Two, more from habit 
than from serious privation; Man's conquest of the new planet was uncertain, and 
the colony took no chances. The three felt a twinging guilt as they looked down 
at the blackened spears of grain, and Ellie clutched at Brian's arm. "Someone's 
coming - " she faltered.
Across the evenly plowed ridges, between rows of ripening wheat, a boy of 
thirteen walked, steadily and unhurried. He was not very tall, but looked 
sturdy; his face was deeply tanned under square - cut dark hair, and he was 
wearing a loose shirt and breeches tucked into low boots, all the same rich deep 
- brown color. Even Brian was silent as the boy advanced to the very foot of the 
pickup plane, paused and looked up at it, then glanced up indifferently at the 
three in the door­way, and began to move around to the tail, toward the smoking 
jets.
Brian quickly dropped Ellie's hand and scrambled to the ground. "Hey there!" he 
called, forgetting the prepared speech on his lips. "Better not go around there, 
it's dangerous - hot!
The boy desisted at once, turning to gaze at him, and after a moment he said in 
slurred but perfectly understandable English, "I saw the streak, and hoped that 
a meteor had fallen." He laughed, turned and began to walk away from them.
Brian looked blankly up at Ellie and Langdon. The man jumped down and gave Ellie 
a hand as she called after the boy "Please - wait a minute - "
He looked around, politely, and before his indiffer­ent courtesy Brian felt the 
words, melting from his lips. It was Langdon who finally, said, in an empty 
voice, "Where can we - We have a message for the -  the Government. Where can we 
get - transportation - to the City?"
"The City?" The boy stared. "What for? Where did you come from? The City?"
Brian quietly assumed command of the situation again. "We are from the first 
Centaurian expedition, the Starward," he said. "We or rather our ship, left this 
planet hundreds of years ago."
"Oh?" The boy smiled in a friendly way. "Well, I suppose you are glad to be 
back. Over that hill," he pointed, "you will find a road which goes toward the 
City." He turned again, this time with a definite air of finality, and started 
to walk away.
The three travelers stared at one another in blank indignation. Brian finally 
took a step forward and shouted: "Hey, come back here!"
With an irritated jerk of his head, the boy turned. "Now what do you want?" he 
demanded.
Ellie said conciliatingly, "This is only the pickup of our ship. We have to - to 
find someone who can tell us where to bring the spaceship down. As you can see," 
she gestured toward the ruined wheat, "our jets have destroyed a part of the 
crop here. Our spaceship is much larger, and we don't want to do any more 
dam­age. Perhaps your father - "
The boy's face, puzzled at first, had cleared while she was talking. "My father 
is not in our village now," he informed them, "but if you will come with me, I 
will take you to my grandfather."
"If you could tell us where the nearest spaceport is - " Brian suggested.
The boy frowned, "Spaceport?" he repeated. "Well, maybe my grandfather can help 
you."
He turned again, and led the way across the field. Langdon and Ellie followed at 
once; Brian hung back, looking uneasily at the pickup. The boy glanced over his 
shoulder. "You need not be anxious about your plane," he called, laughing. "It's 
too large to be stolen!"
Brian stiffened; the boy's attitude was just derisive enough to put him on the 
defensive. Then, realizing the futility of anger, he broke into a run to catch 
up with the others. When he came near them, the boy was saying, a little 
sulkily, "I thought that I would be fortunate enough to find a fallen meteor! I 
have never seen a meteorite." Then, making a tardy attempt to remember his 
manners, he added politely, "Of course, I have never seen a spaceship either - " 
but it was evident that a spaceship was a very poor substitute.
Ellie's thinly shod feet stumbled on the uneven ground, and all three were glad 
when they came out on a smoothed road which wound between low flower­ing trees. 
There seemed to be no vehicles of any kind for the road was just wide enough to 
permit the four to walk abreast. The boy's walk was rapid, and he kept moving, 
almost unconsciously, ahead of them, then looking back and deliberately slowing 
his steps.
Once when he had forged ahead, Langdon murmured, "Evidently vehicular traffic 
has been completely di­verted from rural neighborhoods!" and Brian whis­pered, 
"This is incredible! Either the boy's half - witted, or else even the children 
here are so blas6 that the first star - expedition doesn't mean anything to 
them!"
"I wouldn't be too sure," Ellie said slowly. "There's something that we don't 
understand. Let's not try to figure things out ahead, Brian. Let's just take 
them as they come."
 
 
Ill
 
 
Muscles virtually unused for nearly five years were aching by the time the 
narrow road wound into a village of low clustered houses, built of what seemed 
to be grayish field stone. A profuse display of flowers bloomed in elaborate 
geometrical patterns around nearly every doorstep, and little groups of 
children, dressed in smocks of dark yellow or pale reddish - gray, were chasing 
one another haphazardly on the lawns, shout­ing something rhythmic and 
untuneful. Most of the houses had low trellised porches, and women in short 
light dresses sat in little groups on the porches. The street was not paved, and 
the women did not appear busy; their low - pitched conversation was a musical 
hum, and all down the street the three strangers could hear a sound of singing. 
A man's voice, singing in a low, monotonous rise and fall of notes. It was 
toward this sound of singing that the boy led them, up the steps of a porch 
which was not trellised but roofed, and through an open door.
They stepped into a wide, light room. Two walls seemed to open in slatted 
shutters, giving a view of an evenly patterned garden; on another wall was a 
large fireplace, where embers flickered quietly, and there was a gleaming kettle 
of some light, brilliant metal swung on a crane over the embers. It reminded 
Brian of a picture in one of his oldest history books, and he blinked at the 
anachronism. The other furniture in the room was unfamiliar, low cushioned seats 
built against the walls, and a few closed doors on the fourth wall. From an 
inner room, the singing filled the house: a baritone voice, rich and resonant, 
rising and falling in slow, unfamiliar harmonic patterns.
The boy called: "Grandpa!"
The singer finished one of the odd phrases; then the song ceased, and the three 
strangers heard slow, delib­erate steps behind the closed door. It swung back, 
and a tall old man came out into the main room.
He looked like the boy. His hair was clipped short, but grew down along his 
cheeks, although his chin was shaven clean; he wore a shirt and breeches of the 
same rich brown, and his feet were thrust into slippers of stitched leather. He 
looked strong and vigorous; his hands, tanned and knotty, were extremely well - 
kept, though somewhat stained, and he stood very erect, surveying them with 
great composure, while his deep - set dark eyes studied them from their clipped 
and tended hair to their rubber - sandaled feet. The compo­sure gradually gave 
way to a quizzical smile, and he came forward a few steps. His voice was a 
singer's voice, full and very strong.
"Be welcome, friends. You are home. Destry, who are our guests?"
The boy said calmly, "They came down in a space­ship, Grandpa, or rather, part 
of one. That streak wasn't a meteor at all. They said they wanted to go to the 
City. So I brought them along to you instead."
The man's face did not change by a fraction. Brian had been looking for 
surprise, or some more tangible emotion, but the man only surveyed them equably.
"Please be seated," he invited graciously. "I am Hard Frobisher, friends, and 
this is my grandson Destry."
The three sank on one of the cushioned seats, feel­ing a little like children in 
their first learning - period before the Firsts. Only Brian had presence of mind 
enough to murmur their names. "Brian Kearns - Ellinor Wade - Langdon Forbes - " 
The old man repeated the names, bowing courte­ously to Ellie, at which the girl 
could barely conceal her amazement. He inquired, smiling, "Can I be of 
assistance to you?"
Brian stood up. "The boy didn't tell you, sir, but we're from the first 
Centaurus expedition - the Starward."
"Oh?" A faint flicker of interest crossed Hard Frobisher's face. "That was a 
good long time ago, I am told. Did the Barbarians have some means, then, of 
prolonging life beyond its appointed limits?"
Brian's patience had already gone a long way beyond its appointed limits, and 
now, abruptly, it deserted him.
"Look sir. We're from the first expedition into in­terstellar space. The first. 
None of us left Earth on the Starward. We weren't born. Our hyperspeeds, if you 
know what they are - which I'm beginning to doubt -  threw us into a time - lag. 
There's no need to call us Barbarians, either. The ship's drives were smashed 
when they landed, and we've been four generations, four generations, getting it 
in operable condition to come back to Earth. None of us have ever been on Earth 
before. We're strangers here, understand? We have to ask our way around. We 
asked a civil ques­tion. Now if we could kindly have a civil answer - "
Hard Frobisher raised a placating hand. "I am sorry," he said calmly. "I didn't 
understand. Just what do you want me to do about it?"
Brian made a visible attempt to keep his temper. "Well, first, we want to get in 
touch with the authori­ties. Then I want to find a place where we can bring our 
spaceship down - "
Frobisher was frowning, and Brian fell silent.
"Frankly," the old man said, "I don't know whom you'd contact about a thing like 
that. There is plenty of open island to the south, nearer the city, where you 
might land your ship - "
"Now look - " Brian started, but Langdon touched his arm. So Brian only asked, 
"If you could tell us how to get in touch with the Government. . ."
"Well," the old man said neutrally, "there are three governors in our village, 
but they only regulate the school hours, and make rules about locking houses. I 
wouldn't want to bother them about something foolish like this. I don't think 
they'd have much to say about your . . . oh, yes, spaceship."
That silenced Brian and Langdon completely. Ellie, feeling as if they were being 
tangled into a giant spider web, asked desperately, "Could we go to some other, 
perhaps some larger place?"
Frobisher looked at her, frankly puzzled.
"It's a half a day's walk to Carney," he said, "and when you got there, they 
would tell you the same thing. You are perfectly welcome to put your space­ship 
down on our barrens, if you want to."
Brian stiffened belligerently. "Now let's get this straight. There's a city over 
there. There must be someone there in authority!"
"Oh, the City!" Frobisher's voice held dismissal, "Nobody's lived in any of the 
cities for years! Why should you want to go there?"
Langdon said, baffled, "Look, Mr. Frobisher. We've come all the way from 
Centaurus, to bring Earth the news about our expedition. We'd expected to be 
sur­prised at what we found - after all, it has been a long time since the 
Starward left. But are we supposed to understand from this run - around you're 
giving us that there's nobody to listen, that the first of the interstel­lar 
expeditions doesn't mean anything to anyone?"
"Should it?" asked Frobisher, and his face was even more baffled than Brian's. 
"I can understand your personal predicament somewhat - after all, you've come a 
long way, but why? Didn't you like it where you were? There is only one reason 
why people move from one place to another - and it seems to me that you have 
overdone it."
The room was silent. Hard Frobisher stood up, look­ing indecisively at his 
guests, and Brian half expected him to repeat Destry's move and walk away, 
uninter­ested; but he merely went to the fireplace and peered into the kettle.
"Food is prepared," he remarked. "Can I invite you to join us? Good food is ill 
- seasoned by dissension, and there is no wisdom in an empty belly."
Brian and Langdon just sat and looked dumbly at Frobisher. It was Ellie who said 
firmly, "Thank you, Mr. Frobisher," and dug an elbow into Brian's ribs, 
whispering savagely, "Behave yourself!"
The boy Destry came and helped his .grandfather bring food from the fireplace 
and from an inner room; he conducted the strangers to seats around a sort of 
table. The food was unfamiliar and not altogether pleasant to the strangers, 
accustomed to the elabo­rate synthetics of the ship; Brian, altogether out of 
humor, made almost no effort to conceal his distaste, and Langdon ate 
listlessly; Hard and Destry ate with the unfeigned appetite of men who spend 
much time in the open air, and neither spoke much during the meal except to urge 
food upon their guests. Ellie, finding the curious liquids and semi-solids 
fascinating, if strange, tasted them with an interested professional curiosity, 
wondering how they were prepared.
It was not very long before Hard Frobisher nodded to Destry, and the boy rose 
and began taking dishes from the table. Frobisher pushed back his chair and 
turned to Brian. "We can now discuss your problem, if you wish," he said 
pleasantly. "Full stomachs make wise decisions." He glanced at Ellie, smiling. 
"I regret that there is no woman in my house to entertain you while we talk, 
young lady," he said regretfully, and Ellie dropped her eyes. On the Homeward -  
- as on Terra Two - men and women were equals and neither de­ferred to the 
other. Hard's polite deference was new, and his bland assumption that she could 
have no part in their talk was a somewhat distasteful surprise. Langdon clenched 
his fists, white Brian seemed about to explode. Ellie summed up the situation at 
a glance, and swiftly intervened by rising and glancing shyly at Destry. "Can I 
help you?" she offered diffidently, the boy grinned.
"Sure, come ahead," he told her. "You carry the dishes and I'll bring the 
kettle."
Frobisher settled back, taking a leather pouch from his pocket and meticulously 
stuffing a pipe of carved amber which swiftly revised Langdon's ideas of the 
present level of civilization. Smoking was a habit on Terra Two as well; only 
the smell of the tobacco was unfamiliar. Both young men stifled coughs and 
refused his offer of the sack, taking out their own grayish cigarettes and 
inhaling the sweetish - sour smoke avidly to shut out the rank stench of the 
pipe. Somewhere, behind closed doors, they heard a splashing of water and the 
uncertain falsetto of the boy's voice, mingled with Ellie's merry soprano 
laughter. Brian scowled and leaned forward, his arms on his knees.
"See here, Mr. Frobisher," he said truculently. "I know you are trying to be 
hospitable, but if you don't mind, let's talk business. We have to bring the 
ship down, and after that - " He stopped and stared at the floor, wondering 
suddenly if he were on some kind of reservation for half - wits. No: the room 
was tastefully, if simply, furnished; everything was plain, but nothing crude. 
The wood of the furniture was beautifully stained and polished, and the hand - 
woven rug on the floor matched the thick draperies at the slatted windows. The 
house showed comfort, even a moderated luxury, and Frobisher's accents were 
those of a cultured man. Nor was he merely an eccentric, judging from what Brian 
had briefly seen of the other houses and the glimpsed people. Destry hadn't 
seemed surprised at the plane - he'd known what it was, and yet it hadn't 
impressed him. No, it wasn't savagery. But it was radically different from what 
he had expected, and the change bewildered him. He looked up at one of the many 
pictures which hung about the room, and there, for the first time, sensed a note 
of eccentricity; they were mostly sketches of birds, very precisely drawn, but 
the colors were combined in a fashion which only a madman could endure. . . . 
Then Brian realized that it was this bright, unfamiliar light which made the 
colors bizarre to him, and simultaneously he became conscious that his eyes were 
stinging and watering, and that he had a violent headache. He rested his 
forehead on his clenched hands, closing his eyes.
"It isn't that you aren't welcome here," Frobisher said thoughtfully, pulling at 
his pipe. "We realize that there is only one reason why you would leave your 
home planet, and that would, of course, be because you were unhappy there. And 
so we understand - "
"Of all the stupid, unjustified assumptions - " Brian began furiously, then 
checked himself. What was hap­pening to his caution? He and Langdon were 
effec­tively cut off from the rest of the crew; they couldn't afford to get into 
trouble. He rubbed his aching eyes.
"Sorry, Mr. Frobisher," he said tiredly. "I didn't mean to be offensive."
"No offense taken," Frobisher assured him. "And certainly none was intended by 
me. Am I mistaken - "
"We came here for one reason," Langdon informed him. "To advance man's knowledge 
of the world out­side the solar system. In other words, to finish what the 
Firsts started."
"And, judging by appearances - " Brian's voice was bitter, " - we've wasted our 
time!"
"Yes, I'm afraid you have." Something new in Frobisher's voice made both young 
men look up. "Whether you realize it or not, I am quite aware of your problems, 
Mr. Kearns. I have read a good deal about the Bar - excuse me, about the past." 
He tapped his pipe meditatively on a projecting corner of the fireplace. "I 
suppose it would be impossible for you to return to Centaurus in your 
lifetimes?"
Brian bit his lip. "In our lifetimes - no, not impossi­ble," he answered, "but 
in the lifetimes of anyone we had known, assuming that we could get back. Our 
fuel reserves are not great - " He looked questioningly at Frobisher.
"Then I don't quite know what to do with you," the old man said, and there was a 
genuine personal con­cern in his voice. And that friendly concern was the last 
thing needed to bring Brian to critical mass. Ignor­ing the warning pressure of 
Langdon's hand on his knee, he stood up.
"Look, Frobisher," he said tensely, "just who in hell gave you the authority to 
make this decision, anyhow?"
Frobisher's face did not change by a fraction. "Why, you landed in our field and 
my grandson brought you here."
"So you're just taking responsibility for the whole matter? Do you rule Earth?"
The man's mouth dropped open. "Do I rule . . . Ha, ha, ha!" Frobisher leaned 
back in his chair, hold­ing his sides and rocking suddenly with uncontrollable 
laughter. "Do I rule ..." He collapsed into chuckles again, his mirth literally 
shaking the floor, and the large expansive laughter was so infectious that 
Langdon finally glanced up with a faint, puzzled grin, and even the worst of 
Brian's fury began to drain away a little. "I'm sorry," Frobisher said weakly at 
last, and there were tears in his eyes. "But that - that is the funniest thing 
I've heard since spring sowing! Do I... ha, ha, ha, ha! Wait until I tell my son 
- I'm sorry, Mr. Kearns, I can't help it. Do I rule Earth!" he chuckled again, 
"Heavens forbid! I have enough trouble ruling my grandson!" He laughed again, 
irrepressibly. Brian couldn't see what was so funny and said so.
With an effort, Frobisher controlled his laughter and his eyes sobered - but not 
much - as he looked at Brian. "You did come to me," he pointed out, "and that 
makes it my responsibility. I'm not a man to evade responsibility or refuse you 
hospitality, but frankly, I wish you had found somebody else!" A tiny snort of 
laughter escaped him again, "I can see you'll make trouble here! But if you 
don't listen to me, you'll only have to find somebody else, and I'm afraid that 
whoever you found would tell you just about the same thing!" He smiled, and the 
anxious friendliness in his face took the edge from Brian's anger, although 
annoyed puzzlement remained.
Frobisher added quietly, "There is no reason that Norten village shouldn't have 
this problem, as well as any other." He stood up. "I expect the remainder of 
your ship's crew will be anxious about you. Do I assume correctly that you have 
a communication de­vice?" At Langdon's exasperated nod, Frobisher twitched a 
loose coat from a peg. "Then why not report to them? We can talk further on the 
way - you don't mind if I come, do you?"
"No, not at all," Brian said weakly. "Not at all."
 
 
IV
 
 
Mindful of Caldwell's words about not getting sepa­rated, Brian insisted that 
Ellie should accompany them back to the pickup. Destry, apparently uninterested, 
at first refused his grandfather's invitation to join them, then changed his 
mind. He ran to fetch a warm jacket, but surprisingly, instead of donning it, he 
laid it about Ellie's shoulders. "She's cold," he explained briefly to his 
grandfather, and without waiting for thanks, strode ahead of them, along the 
road.
The sun was dropping westward, and the light was almost unbearable; Brian's eyes 
were squinted tight, and Langdon's forehead furrowed in deep - plowed lines; 
Ellie held one across her forehead, and Brian put his arm around her.
"Headache, darling?" he asked tenderly.
She grimaced. "Will we get used to this light, do you think, or are we going to 
have to put up with this all along?"
Langdon said wryly, "I suppose the Firsts felt like this under Theta Centauri!"
Ellie smiled faintly. "No one spread out a welcome for them."
Frobisher walked ahead of them, with long, swing­ing steps, and Brian said in a 
savage undertone, "I still think this whole thing is an elaborate bluff of some 
sort. Or else we're on a primitive reservation. The whole world can't be like 
this!"
"Oh, don't be silly," Ellie said wearily, rubbing her aching eyes. "How could 
anyone have known that we'd choose to land here?"
Some of the women on the porches called familiarly to Frobisher, and he waved 
gaily to them in return, but no one paid any attention to the strangers, except 
for one plump woman, her hair in curly sausages all over her head, who waddled 
from her steps and to­ward the road. "I see you have guests, Hard," she called 
cheerfully. "If your house is too full, mine is empty!"
Frobisher faced around, smiling. "Your hospitality may be required," he said. 
"There are others, and they have come a long way."
The woman looked at Ellie with a sharp female glance, noting her fair cropped 
hair, the smooth spun - synthetic coverall beneath the boy's jacket, the molded 
sandals and bare legs. Then she put out a fat warm hand. "Are you planning to 
settle in our village, my dear?" she asked.
"They haven't decided," Frobisher answered noncommittally, but Ellie said with a 
shy, impulsive friend­liness, "I do hope so!" and squeezed the offered hand.
"Well, I hope so too, dear. It isn't often we have young neighbors," the plump 
woman replied. "You and your husband" (Ellie blushed at the forthright archaism) 
"be sure and call on us, now, if you need anything before you get settled." She 
smiled and wad­dled back to her doorway.
Langdon said, low - voiced, "It's like being on Terra Two, except that 
everything - everything - "
Brian said, "There must have been some inconceiv­able disaster! Culturally, 
they're a thousand years behind the world when the Starward left. Why, even 
Terra Two is more civilized than they seem to be! Cooking with fire - and these 
little villages - and the cities empty - "
"Oh, I don't know," Ellie murmured surprisingly. "How do you measure culture? 
Isn't it possible that they've progressed in ways we don't know anything about? 
The difference might be in viewpoint."
Brian shook his head stubbornly.
"It's regression," he protested, but Ellie had no time to answer, for they had 
come within sight of the pickup, and Frobisher dropped back to walk with them.
"There is your plane," he said. "Do you intend to communicate from here, or will 
you rejoin your spaceship?"
Brian and Langdon looked at one another. "We haven't thought about it," Langdon 
said at last, "but -  Brian - without a spaceship or at least a radio beaming 
device, how are they going to land?"
Brian frowned. "I don't know much about rockets," he said at last; "the 
hyperdrives are my job. How much landing room do they need?"
Langdon said, troubled, "Paula and Caldwell, be­tween them, could land the 
Homeward in great-grandfather Kearn's biochemistry lab, if they had to, without 
breaking a test tube. But they'd have to have a fix. If they land blind, they're 
apt to set down right on the village." He paused, and clarified, "That is, if 
they just aim at our general direction from what we transmit here."
"In that case," Brian suggested, "we'd better take up the pickup and rejoin the 
ship - and hunt up a good big desert to land blind."
"Rejoining the ship would be quite a problem in this light," Ellie said, 
troubled. "It's going to be dark in less than an hour, I'd say - and I have a 
feeling that we're going to find ourselves completely night - blind."
Frobisher had considerately withdrawn while they were talking, and Brian 
snapped, "What's the matter with your brain, Ellie? You can go around to 
sunward, and match velocities with the Homeward there!"
"But then we might not find this place again," Langdon said surprisingly, and 
Ellie added, "If we go hurtling all around the planet, who knows if we'd find 
this again?"
"For the love of - who cares?"
"I do," said Langdon firmly. "According to Frobisher, conditions are pretty much 
the same everywhere, and - I kind of like that old guy, Brian. I like it here. 
I'd like to land here. Maybe settle down here."
Brian stared. "Are you crazy?
Langdon said, "Not at all. If we want to look around after the Homeward is down, 
fine - we have the pickup, we can do all the exploring we want to. We've plenty 
of fuel for the pickup. We're down, let's stay down."
Brian's face lost a little of its self - confidence; it was the first time that 
any of the crew had ever questioned his judgment, although many had resented his 
meth­ods. He shrugged in a sudden futile misery. "I'm out­voted! And anyhow I 
resigned command when the atomics went on! Settle it with Caldwell by radio!" He 
lurched away from them and around toward the other side of the pickup. He heard 
the staccato bark of the radio inside, but paid no attention until he suddenly 
became conscious of Ellie, close beside him.
She raised her face, with an affectionate smile. Brian, even distracted by a 
thousand irritated thoughts, found time to wonder at the new mystery of her fair 
hair in the golden sun: the red was dimmed out, here, and the short curls seemed 
a pure, delicate silver; she was very white and fragile in this new light, and 
Brian reached impulsively to pull her close. She responded eagerly, her arms 
going around him and her face lifted with a simplicity that he had not quite 
expected.
"Journey's end," she said gently. "We've waited a long time for this, Brian, 
even if that electronic calcu­lator was off - beam about what we'd find down 
here. Kiss me, you idiot."
The strength in his arms was astonishing, and she gave a little cry. "Hey, I'm 
not used to weighing so much, take it easy - " she protested, laughing and the 
laughter trailed away as he bent his head down to hers. She was conscious of the 
sun in her eyes, of the physical fatigue from unaccustomed exercise, and the 
dragging feel of too much gravity - Terra Two was a small, light world. There 
was a crushing urgency in Brian's arms, and he strained her desperately close 
for a frantic minute, then abruptly pushed her away, his voice roughened.
"Where did Frobisher go? Damn it, Ellie, I need a clear head right now! The way 
it looks, we'll have the rest of our lives for that kind of thing!"
Hurt, but sensing the plea for help that begged her from behind the facade of 
his taut control, Ellie swal­lowed the pain of the personal rejection, and 
forced herself to think beyond the immediate moment. "He and Destry went to see 
how much of the grain had been ruined - "
"Hell, we can pay for the grain. There they come now - " Brian kicked out at a 
stalk of wheat, a curi­ously futile movement, and said in an odd, quenched 
voice, looking at his foot, "It's going to take months for us to get back in 
shape, after so long in free fall. We're coordinated all wrong for so much 
gravity. No­tice the way Frobisher walks? Like he owned the world - " Resentment 
and envy mingled in his voice, and he stopped, then finished in a surprised 
tone, " - or as much of it as he wants!"
He said abruptly as the grandfather and grandson joined them, "Mr. Frobisher, 
we'll be glad to pay for what wheat we ruined."
"I would not have mentioned it," Frobisher said, and for the first time there 
was something like respect in his voice, "but it shows a good spirit that you 
have mentioned it. I have abundance, and you will have much to do after your 
crew lands. But if you insist upon payment, you can contribute task - work next 
sea­son, after you are settled."
Brian was puzzled, but decided not to press the point. Langdon rejoined them, 
and he asked, "What did Caldwell say?"
"He'll try it, if we'll fix up some kind of radio beam," Langdon responded. 
"Where do you want us to land, Mr. Frobisher?"
Hard Frobisher began to draw a sketch - map with a long stick in the dirt. "Over 
that rise - "
"We'll move the pickup over there," Ellie decided, men abruptly proffered the 
invitation, "Ride over there with us?"
Hard Frobisher looked speculatively at the plane, then toward the horizon. "Oh, 
it isn't a long walk," he said, but Destry said eagerly, "I believe I'd like it, 
grandpa."
The old man smiled deprecatingly. "The young are enthusiastic, Miss Wade," he 
said, almost in apology, "but - very well."
Brian logged another point of bewilderment. Could any educated humans be so 
trusting? Even on Terra Two, a well - united colony, there was a certain 
individ­ual wariness, and strangers - how did Frobisher and Destry know they 
wouldn't be kidnapped?
It was an incredible relief to get back inside the pickup and switch on the 
familiar crimson light. Destry expressed mild surprise at the lighting, but 
Frobisher asked no questions and did not seem impressed when the pickup rose 
straight upward and circled before relanding at the edge of the large barren 
tract where they were to bring the Homeward down. At only one point in the whole 
maneuver did Frobisher show the slightest surprise, and that was when Ellie took 
the controls; he glanced at Brian, then at Langdon, and then, in frank 
amazement, at the small slim girl at the controls; but he made no comment.
They landed, and Langdon touched the radio. Brian took it from his hand. "Hello? 
Hello the Homeward? Kearns talking. That you, Tom?"
Tom Mellen's husky voice, very far away, asked thinly, "Was I right about no 
spaceports?" "You were." Brian did not elaborate.
"We've got the direction of your beam. But Paula says if we follow it in, we'll 
land straight on the pickup. And if we don't, how are we going to hit the spot 
you've picked out for us?" Tom sounded puzzled. "In the last few seconds of 
braking, this hulk isn't very easy to steer."
"Hell!" Brian swore. "Hold on a minute!" He ex­plained the situation briefly to 
Langdon. "I told you so!"
Langdon said grimly, "There's only one way to han­dle it. Take the fuel out of 
the pickup - impact would blow it up - move it out where we want them to land, 
and let them land on it. The pickup's expendable. The crew isn't. They'd land 
hard, but the crew will be in skyhooks, and Caldwell in a crash cockpit. 
Nobody'll be hurt."
"We're going to need the pickup later," Brian ar­gued stubbornly.
"Well, have you a better idea?" Langdon asked. "If they follow the beam in part 
way, and try to swerve in the last few seconds, they're apt to miscalculate by a 
degree or two, and burn up the village."
"I still think we ought to hunt up a good - sized desert," Brian insisted.
Destry interrupted suddenly, in a tone of disgust, "Say, when you want a 
kingfisher to dive, you throw a hunk of bread where you want him to dive - you 
don't stand and hold it! If your radio - what is it - beam comes from that," he 
gestured at the transmitter, "why not just rip that thing out of the plane, fix 
it to send out a steady signal, and take it out where you want your spaceship to 
land? It won't hurt the spaceship to land on anything that small, will it?"
Brian stared at the boy in amazement for a minute, and Langdon's mouth dropped 
open.
"Destry," Ellie said after a brief silence, "you have the makings of a 
scientist."
"Look," the boy said uncomfortably. "The idea may not be much good, but why 
insult me?" "It is good," Langdon interrupted. "I don't know why I didn't think 
of it myself, except that I'm half-witted in this light! Brian, that's it. 
Ellie, while I send word to Mellen - before I rip this out - get under the seat 
and find the radio kit; I may have to resolder a few wires. Looks like we'll be 
in the dark by the time we finish, too; better get out the small lamps. Come on, 
get busy - " He flipped the switch open. "Home­ward? Forbes speaking. Tom? 
Listen, in about twenty minutes we'll have a fix set up - "
Brian and Ellie were struggling to lift the heavy seat; the unaccustomed gravity 
made it almost impos­sible to budge. Destry caught one end and heaved it up 
easily, and Ellie and Brian bent over the equip­ment stored there. The girl 
murmured in Brian's ear, "There goes your theory about regression! That kid knew 
what he was talking about."
Brian snorted. "And used an analogy from natural history! It was obvious enough, 
knowing the purpose of the radio. If either Langdon or I had been thinking, we'd 
have hit on it."
Ellie did not answer; there seemed no use in making Brian angry again. She went 
and stood watching Langdon working swiftly and expertly to dismantle and 
readjust the radio set to emit a self - contained, steady signal. He had to 
switch on the lights in the pickup before he finished, and before the impromptu 
homing device was completed, the sun had gone down. As they stood in the doorway 
of the pickup, Langdon scowled.
"I can't see my hand before my eyes!" he protested, and took one of the small 
red hand lamps Ellie handed him. He looked at it disgustedly. "I can set the 
signal up with this, yes - but I don't know the lay of the land!" He gestured to 
the vast empty tract of barren land, and added, "I'll get lost there, or set it 
up on a side hill!"
Destry volunteered: "I know this place like my own hand - I'll come along and 
find a flat space."
"Need any help?" Brian offered, but Langdon shook his head. "No thanks. No sense 
in both of us getting tangled up in this murk." He picked up the homing device 
and, with Destry, moved away across the field which, to Brian and Ellie, was 
inky - dark, although in actuality it was bathed in clear moonlight. They stood 
in the door of the pickup, straining their eyes for the reddish, bobbing glimmer 
of Langdon's light, and Ellie shuddered in the rough warmth of Destry's coat. 
Brian's arm stole round her in the darkness.
She said tremulously, "What would have happened if we'd gone in at Mars!"
Frobisher, behind them, drew a harsh breath. "You're certainly lucky you 
didn't!" he said thankfully. "You couldn't have lived there three days, unless 
you stayed with your ship - I assume the ship is self - contained?"
"Oh, yes," Brian told him. "But - Mars was a siz­able colony when the Starward 
left!"
Frobisher shrugged. "Everybody came in from Mars before the spacers stopped 
running. There's no water there at all, now."
Brian murmured, ". . . and by now you should have had all the planets colonized, 
and reached most of the nearer stars!"
The older man's voice lost its pleasant inflection. "You say some very 
surprising things, Mr. Kearns," he said dryly. "You don't say that we could have 
colonized the planets - which, of course, is true - but that we should have. Do 
you mind telling me why? The planets are not exactly suited for human 
habita­tion, except this one - and I would hate to have to live on any other."
Brian asked almost savagely, "You mean there is no space travel?"
"Why, no," Frobisher said slowly. "No one cares to go to the planets."
"But ... the planets had already been reached, conquered, when the Starward 
left!"
Frobisher shrugged. "The Barbarians did a great many things which we regard as 
stupid," he said. "But why should it be called conquest, to encourage men to go 
out to worlds for which they are not biologically adapted? I have read much 
about the Barbarians, their insatiable egotism, their idle, childish curiosity, 
their continual escapism and refusal to face their prob­lems, but - forgive me 
for saying this, no personal offense is intended - I had never believed it until 
today!"
Ellie took Brian's arm before he could answer. "Look there, Langdon's signaling 
- they must have the trans­mitter set up," she said, and moved her lamp in a 
wide circle. Before long, Langdon and Destry emerged from the bath of inky 
darkness, and sank down on the ground, in the little flood of reddish light from 
the pickup's windows. "That did it," Langdon said. "Now we sit and wait while 
Paula pinpoints the beam, and Caldwell will put her down right where we want."
"I hope somebody remembers to look after Ein­stein," Ellie worried. "I'd hate to 
have him break his neck in the last few seconds of the trip!"
"Judy will take care of him," Langdon reassured, and they waited in the red - 
cast darkness. Brian was mustering all the arguments he had heard from the 
Firsts about the necessity that had backed developing space travel.
"What about overpopulation? What about diminish­ing food supplies and natural 
resources?"
Frobisher's laugh was loud in the darkness. "Cer­tainly not even the Barbarians 
expected to find natural food supplies on Mars or Venus!" he chuckled. 
"Inter­stellar travel might have solved it, but at prohibitive cost. Still, once 
man decided to stop squandering natu­ral resources on vast theoretical projects, 
and throw­ing them irrecoverably out into space, that problem was easily 
solved."
"But what forced the decision?" Brian asked almost timidly.
"I wouldn't know," Frobisher said thoughtfully, "but when a decision is really 
necessary, as a rule, some one makes it. Probably the overpopulation reached 
such extremes - the solar system as a whole, of course, since Earth had to feed 
Mars and Venus too - that for one or two whole generations, every able - bodied 
man
and woman had to put all his efforts into food making instead of theoretical 
astronomy or whatever they called it. And by the time they had that problem 
solved, people were thinking of science in terms of human benefits, and probably 
realized that their resources could be handled more efficiently here on Earth. 
That - I mean thinking in terms of cost and human benefits - did away with war, 
too. It doesn't take long for attitudes to grow up. Then, too, during the over - 
populated generations, the population was almost en­tirely neurotic. The 
scientists of that day simply made it possible, I imagine, for women to avoid 
having the children they didn't want anyway, so that no one had children except 
the healthy - minded women whose pri­mary interest was in children. The neurotic 
death wish in the others effectively reduced the population in only two or three 
generations. You might say that the neu­rotics committed race suicide. Is that 
your ship, or another of Destry's meteors?"
They scrambled down, stumbling in the darkness, as the incredible rocket - roar 
sounded, and, on a collaps­ing telescope of fire, the Homeward screamed down to 
its resting - place. Brian, standing between Destry and Ellie, wondered - but 
was too weary and too overexcited to ask - if Destry still regretted his failure 
to find a meteor.
Explanations, introductions and much rapid - fire conversation made the landing 
a babble of noise.
"Hey, we're here!"
"Who thought up that homing device?"
"Hey, I'm blind! No light on this planet? Couldn't we have landed sunward?"
"What, in China?"
"Damned gravity, I can't walk!"
"Ellie!" (More imperatively than the other voices.) "Come here and get this 
devil - ridden cat of yours!"
Ellie dashed to Judy, who was carrying the squirm­ing Einstein as she stumbled, 
clumsy - footed, down the ladder. "Here, take this animal!" she said crossly. 
"He's pulling my hair out by the roots!" She shoved the thick curls back over 
her shoulder, and fretted, "Hair's a worse nuisance in gravity than out of it!"
Ellie gently unwound her pet's suckers from Judy's ringlets, and the animal 
clung to her shoulder, squirm­ing in crazy anticipation, struggling to get to 
the ground. She climbed the ladder painfully, wondering if she would ever adjust 
to the heavy gravity again, and, shoving into the lounge, ripped a strip of 
cloth from her skyhook to make a leash for the little animal. It was docile, but 
the prospect of running freely might tempt it to wildness. '
As she came down again, she heard Frobisher's rich voice. "I offer the 
hospitality of our village and my home, for as long as you wish."
Stumbling on the final rung, Ellie almost fell against Mellen and Paula, 
standing silently in each other's arms at its foot. Their faces glowed dimly in 
the red­dish shimmer from the open door of the ship, and a pang of envy stabbed 
through Ellie. They had only one emotion about the landing. They didn't care 
what they found - they were here, and together. She turned swiftly, not wanting 
to violate their moment, but Tom looked up at her and smiled with a joyfulness 
that made his gaunt good - natured face almost handsome. Paula reached out and 
hugged Ellie, cat and all. "It's all over!" she whispered jubilantly. "We're 
here!" But her dark eyes were a little sad, too, as she added, "I only wish 
there was some way we could let - our moth­ers and fathers - know that we came 
safely."
"They would be sure of that," Ellie comforted softly.
Tom Mellen scowled. "What's Kearns sounding off about now? Shush, girls - "
Brian was protesting, "Look, we can't all go. Some of us ought to stay aboard 
the Homeward. I suggest that we sleep aboard, and visit the village in the 
morning - "
"You stay if you like," Caldwell said mutinously. "I've seen enough of the 
Homeward for a lifetime!"
Then open rebellion burst out. Little Judy set off the reaction by proclaiming 
violently. "If I ever go aboard the Homeward again, they'll have to carry me and 
tie me!" and Mellen shouted, "The trip's over and we're private citizens again, 
Kearns, so stop pulling your rank on us!" In the storm of voices, the Centaurian 
cat went wild and clawed its way from Ellie's shoulder, tumbling with a queer, 
staggering gait across the rough dark grass. Ellie screamed, "Catch him, catch 
him!" and Paula made a grab for the creature, but missed, to trip and fall in 
the darkness. She lay there, laughing hysterically, watching the cat as it dived 
into the ring of lights. It stumbled and weaved on its spindly legs, thrusting 
pouch and tail weirdly to balance against the unfamiliar gravity; it sniffed the 
grass, with a musical caterwauling, then rolled over and over in the dark grass 
of the barrens, like a crazy asteroid rumbling in a wildly erratic orbit.
Brian didn't have a chance after that. The Homeward's crew, barely more than 
adolescents, and semi - hysterical anyway with release from strain and the 
euphoria of journey's end, lay on the grass and rolled and stretched like 
children, paying less than no atten­tion to Brian's harangue. By the time Ellie 
had man­aged to recapture the staggering Einstein, and the laughter - drunk 
youngsters had calmed a little, Brian had only one desire; to restore some 
semblance of dignity to himself and his crew. Livid and all but speechless, he 
tersely requested Caldwell, the calmest of the group, to accept Frobisher's 
hospitality on be­half of all, and watched, leaning somberly against the ladder, 
as they trooped away, guided by Destry with a lantern, still laughing wildly at 
nothing, and hanging on to each other's hands in the darkness to keep from 
falling.
Hard Frobisher walked steadily toward him, and on an impulse Brian asked him, 
"Would you like to come aboard?"
Hard answered unexpectedly, "Yes, I believe I'd be interested to see the inside 
of your ship," and followed Brian up the ladder, navigating the rungs with more 
ease than Brian himself, and into the lounge.
He looked curiously at the skyhooks and the com­plicated recreation devices, 
inspected the cabins with­out much comment, gave an interested hum in the Food 
Culture department. Finally Brian led him up­ward, into the enormous cabin where 
he himself had spent most of the voyage, handling the incredibly com­plex IS 
drives.
And here, before the tremendous machinery, Fro­bisher seemed at last impressed. 
He broke his silence with a wondering, "And you - you know all about this - this 
gimcrackery?"
Since the IS drives weighed upwards of a hundred tons, Brian laughed tolerantly 
at this understatement. "Yes, I'm a drive technician. I spent some time 
training."
"It must take a lifetime to learn all this!"
Brian condescended, "No, only about twelve years."
"Twelve years!" Frobisher repeated. "Twelve years, and how many - four? - on the 
way here, wasted on a room full of machines!" And now Brian uncomfort­ably 
recognized the emotion in his voice. It was pity. "You poor boy," Frobisher 
said, and repeated "Poor boy! To waste sixteen years on these metal levers and 
things! No wonder you are - " He broke off, perhaps aware of the tightness of 
Brian's clenched jaw.
Brian said in a low and deadly voice, "Oh, don't stop there! No wonder I am - 
what!"
"Neurotic," Frobisher said quietly. "Of course you must give yourself some 
reason why you have not wasted your life." And sadly he shook his head. 
"For­tunately, you are still young - "
"This ship," Brian said stiffly, "is the greatest accomplishment of the human 
race! If I live to be twice your age, I shall never - " Abruptly he rose and 
flicked a switch. The great dome cleared, and the immense magnifiers brought 
down the newly blossoming stars so that the man and boy stood under a vast, 
blazing galaxy of fire. "Damn it," Brian said huskily and his voice caught. 
"Man, we brought this little ship across nine light - years of nothing, nothing, 
nothing! We stepped on worlds where no human being had ever been before! You 
can't make out that that's noth­ing! It's the biggest thing humanity ever did - 
and I had the privilege to be part of it - " He was stam­mering, and, aware of 
it, he stopped.
Frobisher looked sad and embarrassed. "Poor lad, and what for? What did you, 
personally, get from it? What good did it do - not you alone - any single hu­man 
being?"
Brian shouted suddenly, "You senile, half - witted old imbecile. I don't suppose 
you ever heard of ab­stract knowledge!"
"It isn't wholly unknown to me," Frobisher said coldly, but added, again with 
the same anxious friend­liness, "Well my boy, I suppose you believe as you've 
been taught - but can you show me one single human, now or in the past, who was 
benefited by the trip of the Starward, except in his personal vanity? I think, 
if you carefully examined the matter, you'd find that the building, launching 
and cost of the Starward defrauded quite a large number of people."
Brian said almost desperately, "Individuals don't matter. Knowledge - any 
knowledge - is for the good of the race as a whole - to lift humanity out of the 
mud of the sea bottom - toward the stars - "
"I can't breathe such thin air," Frobisher said lightly. "The mud is much more 
comfortable."
"And where would you be," Brian almost shouted, "if your remote ancestor had 
never crawled down a tree trunk because he was comfortable where he was?"
"Why," Frobisher returned, looking up at the stars that were brilliant in the 
dome, "I should be very happily scratching myself and swinging by my tail. Do 
you think the great apes have any ambition to be human? Unfortunately, I've come 
too far to be happy in a treetop or a cave. But it seems to me that it's 
important, for any individual human, to find the abso­lute minimum with which he 
can recover that state of effortless happiness he lost when he left the 
treetops. Do you know what this ship reminds me of?"
"No!" Brian snapped.
"A brontosaurus." Frobisher did not elaborate, and in surly silence Brian 
snapped a switch. The stars went out.
"Come on," he muttered, "let's get out of here."
Brian slept little that night. At daybreak he stole into the room where the six 
women of the crew were sleeping, and quietly woke them; one by one, wrap­ping 
themselves sleepily in blankets, they tiptoed into the men's bedroom, where the 
crew gathered close, listening to Brian's soft, savage whispers.
"Kids, we've got to do something - anything to get away from this madhouse!"
"Go easy, Brian," Mellen interrupted. "That's strong language, and I don't like 
it. These people aren't crazy, from what we saw and heard last night. They think 
we're a little off course, though."
Caldwell muttered, "They're probably right. They used to say that being too long 
in space drove men crazy."
Brian said bitterly, "You all seem insane!"
"I don't blame them," Ellie said unexpectedly. "What is the good of going 
shooting all over the galaxy? It was fine, back in the days when it made people 
happy, but these people are happy without it."
"Brian's right, of course," said Don Isaacs, a quiet boy who had never grown too 
friendly with any of the crew except Marcia, and who never had much to say. "But 
there's this. Let's be practical. We're here. We can't go back to Terra Two. And 
we can't start re­forming them. So let's just make the best of it."
Mellen said shortly, "Good for you, Don. And one more thing: if Kearns keeps 
shooting off his big mouth, we're apt to land in the local equivalent of the 
lock - up, for disturbing the peace or something. The peace seems to be valued 
pretty highly around here."
"But what are we going to do?" Brian wanted to know. "We can't just live here, 
can we?"
"And why not?" Paula's voice was defiant, and Judy murmured, "There aren't as 
many gadgets and things as there are on Terra Two, but it's certainly a better 
place than the Ship!"
Mellen pulled Paula's small shadowy form upright beside him. "I don't know why 
you came on the trip, Brian," he said. "But I came for one reason: because the 
Firsts trained me for it, and because if I'd begged off, somebody else would 
have had to. This isn't home, but it's as close to it as we're apt to find. I 
like it. Paula and I are going to settle down, and build a house or something."
Langdon added, "It's no secret that Judy and I and Don and Marcia, - " he 
paused, "and Brian and Ellie too - have been waiting a lot longer than we wanted 
to wait. There are a couple of hundred people in this village. Nice people, too, 
I'll bet. I like that old fel­low. He reminds me of great - grandpa Wade. 
Anyhow, that's almost as many as they have on Terra Two. And I'll bet they don't 
all spend their time knocking them­selves out, synthesizing food and exploring 
and cata­loguing the whole planet, either!"
"They certainly don't!" Ellie slid her arm through Brian's. "They are, now, 
where Terra Two is, without the struggle. They've conquered the planet. They can 
quit trying."
But Mellen murmured derisively, "Kearns is heart­broken! He wanted to find 
mechanical computers tell­ing everybody when to spit, and robots doing all the 
housework!"
"Yes . . ." Brian said thickly. "I guess I did . . ."
He turned his back on them and slammed out.
Ellie thrust her way through the others and ran out into the new day. She 
plunged her way through the gradually thinning darkness after his retreating 
shadow, and found him, huddled at the foot of the pickup. She knelt close to him 
and put her warm hands over his cold ones.
"Brian - oh, my dearest - "
"Ellie, Ellie!" He flung his arms around her, hiding his head against her thin 
dress. The girl held him tight, without speaking. How young he was, she thought, 
how very young. He'd started training for this work before he could read. Twelve 
years, training for the biggest job in the world he knew. And now it all 
collapsed under him.
Brian said bitterly, "It's the waste, Ellie. Why - we might as well have stayed 
on Terra Two!"
"That's exactly what Frobisher said," Ellie told him gently. She glanced at the 
reddening clouds in the east, and such a wave of homesickness wrenched at her 
that she nearly sobbed.
"Ellie - why?" he insisted. "Why? What makes a culture just stop, go dead, 
stagnant? They were right on the borders of conquering the whole universe! What 
made them stop?" The agonized earnestness of the question made Ellie's voice 
very tender.
"Maybe they didn't stop, Brian. Maybe they just progressed in another direction. 
Space travel was right for the culture we knew - or maybe it wasn't. Remem­ber 
what the Firsts told us, about the Russo - Venusian War, and the Mars Raids? 
These people - maybe they've achieved what all cultures were looking for, and 
never found."
"Utopia!" Brian sneered, and pushed her away.
"No," said Ellie very low and put her arms about him again. "Arcadia."
"You're just the same, anyway. . . . Ellie, whatever happens, don't you leave me 
too - " he begged.
"I won't," she promised. "Never. Look, Brian, the sun's coming up. We should go 
back."
"Yeah, big day ahead," he said, and his mouth was too young to twist into such 
bitter lines. Then it re­laxed, and he smiled and pulled her close to him.
"Not just yet . . ."
Paula and Ellie stood on a knoll, near the aban­doned Homeward, and watched the 
skeletal houses going up almost visibly beneath them. "The entire village has 
turned out!" Paula marveled. "Our house will be finished before night!"
"I'm glad there was land near the village for us," Ellie murmured. "Don't you 
feel as if you'd always lived here? And in only four months!"
The dark girl's face was sad. "Ellie, can't you do anything to keep Brian from - 
from sounding off at Tom? One day Tom will up and paste him one, and then you 
know what will happen to us!"
Ellie sighed. "And I'd hate to have either of us turned out of the village! It 
isn't all Brian's fault, Paula - " But then she paused, smiled sadly, and 
fin­ished "I'm afraid he usually starts it, though. I'll do what I can, of 
course - "
"Brian is crazy!" Paula said emphatically. "Ellie - is it really true, that you 
and Brian will go on living in the Homeward?" She glanced distastefully at the 
black mass of the starship, and went on, "Why do you stand for it?"
"I'd live with Brian in a worn - out hydroponics tank, Paula. You would too, if 
it were Tom," Ellie said wearily. "And Brian's right, some one should keep the 
ship from being dismantled. Any of you had the same choice."
Paula murmured, "I like our house better, espe­cially now - " and she put her 
head close to Ellie and whispered. Ellie hugged her delightedly, then asked, 
"Are you feeling all right, Paula?"
The girl hesitated before answering: "I tell myself it's all my imagination," 
she said at last. "This planet belonged to our ancestors, our race; my body 
should adapt to it easily. But after being born and growing up on Terra Two 
where I weighed half what I do here, and then so long in free fall - I know it's 
hard for all of us, this gravity, but since the baby . . . My body is one damned 
enormous ache, night and day!"
"You poor thing - " Ellie put an arm around her friend. "And I think I have 
troubles because my eyes still hurt in this light!"
Judy, heavy - footed, puffed up the slope. She had wound her heavy hair into a 
coil on her neck, and would have been pretty, in her light synthetic ship's 
coverall, had her eyes been less painfully screwed up against the brilliant 
sunlight. "Lazy things," she called gaily. "The men are hungry!"
"In a minute," Ellie answered, but did not move. She still found it more 
convenient to prepare food in the culture units of the Homeward, but disliked 
doing so now. However, on occasions such as today, when the villagers had turned 
out en masse, making a holi­day of building the five new houses, it would make 
it easy to feed almost three hundred.
Langdon and Brian came up the hill, Hard Frobisher striding easily beside them. 
Langdon squinted at the women and finally pretended to identify Judy. "You women 
are getting spoiled," he teased. "On Terra Two, you'd be working along with the 
men, Judy!"
Judy tossed her head. "I enjoy being spoiled," she said pertly, "and I'll have 
enough to do, learning what women do here!"
There was a derisive twist in Brian Kearns' smile. "I came off lucky," he 
commented sourly. "Elbe at least had training for this kind of Me. What about 
you, Paula, are you sorry not to be playing nurse to your electronic 
calculator?"
Paula gave an eloquent shrug. "The women of the Starward chose to be scientists 
and were chosen because they were scientists! I learned navigation because my 
grandmother learned to fix a cyclotron before she had her babies on Terra Two! 
I'm shedding no tears."
"Well, suppose you two come and have a lesson in food culture," Ellie 
admonished, and the three women turned toward the ship. At the foot of the 
ladder, however, Ellie paused. "Paula, dear, you shouldn't climb these steps 
now. Go on back, we'll manage by ourselves," she offered gently, and Paula 
gratefully turned back to rejoin the men.
Meanwhile, Frobisher sat looking down at the rising houses. "Soon you will be 
part of our village," he commented. "I think you have all done well."
Brian nodded curtly in acknowledgment. He had not been prepared to find the 
village operating as a self - contained colony, very much like the one at Terra 
Two - the crew of the Homeward had expected to re - enter the complex financial 
structure of the world the Starward had left. But the system seemed simplic­ity 
itself. Every man owned as much land as he, alone, was able to work, and owned 
whatever else he made with his own hands. A man gave his work wherever it was 
needed, and in return was entitled to take what he needed; food from those who 
grew it, clothes from those who made them, and so forth. Whatever he needed 
beyond the necessities of life must be earned by industry, good management and 
private arrange­ments. Brian found the system easy and congenial, even enjoying 
the job he did - a carpenter in Norten had given him work, and Brian, whose 
training had familiarized him with tools and machinery, had found no trouble in 
adapting his specialized skills to carpen­try and building. There was always 
building going on somewhere in the village, it seemed. Brian made a good living.
And yet, for all its simplicity, the system seemed remarkably inefficient. Brian 
said, looking down at the sprawled houses, "I would think it would be easier if 
you had some kind of central distribution system."
"It's been tried, often," the old man answered pa­tiently. "Every few years, a 
group of villages will consolidate, to exchange services, or set up 
communi­cations systems for private individuals, or distribute foods that can't 
be grown locally, or luxury goods of one kind or another. But that means 
devising a means of exchange, and keeping account of credits, and so forth. As a 
rule, the disadvantages are so much greater than the advantages that the 
consolidation breaks down again within a year or two."
"But there's no law against it?" Brian asked.
"Oh, no!" Frobisher sounded shocked. "What would be the sense of that? The 
purpose of the whole system is to leave each man as free as possible! Most 
places are just about like Norten - the maximum of comfort, and the minimum of 
trouble."
Brian murmured, "I should think, then, that you'd want all kinds of labor - 
saving devices. You cook with fire - isn't it easier to have food culture units, 
such as we have on the Ship?"
Frobisher gave the matter grave attention. "Well, a wood fire imparts a fine 
flavor to food," he remarked. "Most people prefer it. And a cook must take pride 
in what she cooks, or why cook at all? And, although food culture units may be 
easier, if one is lazy, for those who use them, no one wants to take the time to 
manufacture them. One man can build a fireplace in a day, with a neighbor to 
help, and cook with it for the rest of his life. For a food culture unit, a man 
would have to spend years in learning to build it, and dozens of skilled and 
unskilled workers take months to build it; and, in order to make them cheaply 
enough for one man to buy, millions of them must be made, which means hundreds 
and thousands of people crowded together, just making them, having no time to 
grow or cook their own food, or live their own lives. The cost is too high. It's 
more trouble than it's worth."
Langdon asked him suddenly, "Just what is the pop­ulation now?"
Frobisher frowned. "You people certainly are full of questions! Who knows? 
Collectively, people are noth­ing but statistics, which are no good to anyone. 
People are individuals. A few years ago, a philosopher in Carney - that's where 
Destry was born - worked out what he called the critical factor in population: 
the point where a village becomes too large to be efficient as a self - 
contained unit, and starts to break down. It's a nice problem, if you're 
interested in abstract mathe­matics - which I'm not."
"But I am," Paula said behind them, lowering her­self carefully to the grass 
beside the men. "It sounds interesting."
Frobisher looked at her with fatherly friendliness. "You and Tom can come with 
me, next time I go to Carney," he invited. "I'll introduce you to Tuck - but all 
I know is, if a village gets too large, it's more trouble than convenience, and 
about half the popula­tion will go away and start a new one, or move to a 
smaller place."
"It doesn't sound very workable,", Brian said with sour skepticism.
"It works," Frobisher answered equably. "That's the final test of any theory - 
hullo, here's Tom. We're not lying down on the job, Tom - just waiting for the 
women to bring dinner."
Mellen thrust a penciled scrap of paper into Langdon's hands. "Is Judy around? I 
can't read this - her writing is half Russian and half Arabic!"
"She's in the ship with Kearns' wife," Frobisher answered, not noticing how 
Paula winced at the word which, on Terra Two, had acquired an ignominious 
connotation of servitude and sexual inferiority. The three men from the Homeward 
tried to ignore the vulgarity, and Langdon gave a self - conscious laugh. "I 
think I can translate for you."
"What have you got there?" Brian asked, interested against his will - Judy had 
been an electrician aboard the Homeward, responsible for all lighting circuits, 
and her work was capable and excellent. He squinted toward the paper. Langdon 
scowled. "I can't see a thing in this cussed sunlight! What's it supposed to be, 
Tom?"
"Wiring diagram. There are red bulbs in the Home­ward, and Judy's going to put 
lighting in our house -  and yours, too. Didn't she tell you?"
"I thought you'd both gone all out on the primitive life," Brian muttered. 
Langdon snorted mockingly, and Mellen clenched his fists, then relaxed, with an 
easy grin.
"It's a free country," he said. Then suddenly he added, "Brian, it's none of my 
business, but are you and Ellie really going to stick to this damn foolish­ness? 
You'll be lonely up here. We could start on a house for you tomorrow."
"Somebody's got to keep the ship from being dis­mantled," Brian said stiffly. 
"And that reminds me, if Judy's going to do any wiring, she'd better use spare 
parts. No more trying to dismantle the drive units!"
Langdon laughed softly, but Mellen's face darkened in annoyance. He said 
shortly, "You aren't captain any more. The Homeward isn't your personal 
prop­erty, Brian."
"I'm aware of that," Brian rasped. "Neither does it belong to the crew 
collectively. It's being held in trust. And since nobody else has any sense of 
responsi­bility, I'm acting as caretaker."
Frobisher looked up as if he were about to speak, but Paula forestalled him, 
asking gently, "What for? We've no fuel, we'll never take off again."
The nightmare settled down on Brian again. He was fighting - but fighting an 
intangible, unresisting oppo­nent! If they had been malicious, it would have 
been easier. They weren't malicious, they were only stupid -  unable to 
understand just why the Homeward must be safeguarded as their only link with 
civilized life. A year or two, he thought grimly, and they'll realize just what 
I'm doing, and why. Just now, this primitivism is new, novel. But they are 
basically intelligent, sooner or later they will get tired of this. They can't 
live from day to day, like the villagers - but how do the villagers live this 
way? Frobisher's a cultured man. Destry's a bright boy. How can they stand it, 
living like nice clean animals?
"What deep imponderable are you meditating?" Ellie mocked his serious expression 
with a gay grimace, and thrust a basket into his hands, loaded with hot food. 
"Langdon, Paula, Mr. Frobisher - all hands needed to carry food. Here, Destry, 
you take a basket too," she commanded, handing one to the boy. "Bring this down 
to the village, now. Dinner is ready. And hurry up before it all gets cold."
Brian absent - mindedly picked up a biscuit - like cake of protein and munched 
at it as they descended the hill, his mind still halfway circling the continual 
prob­lem. Ellie offered her basket, in turn, to Destry and Frobisher, and the 
old man politely took a cake, but Destry shook his head. "Thanks, I don't care 
for syn­thetics, Ellie."
"Destry!" His grandfather said with unnecessary sharpness, while Ellie murmured, 
"I didn't know you'd ever tasted them."
Destry stumbled over a rock in the path and used a couple of unfamiliar 
expletives; by the time he had picked himself up, retrieved the luckily unhurt 
basket, and apologized unnecessarily for the words he had used - he might have 
saved the trouble, for Ellie had never heard them and did not know whether they 
were sacred or profane - Ellie had forgotten her question for another.
"Have you ever been out of Norten, Destry?"
"Once or twice. I went to Carney with my father, when he went to teach a man 
there how to weave a rug. He weaves beautiful rugs - much better ones than 
ours."
"I see," Ellie murmured.
"He wanted me to come with him this time, but one place is pretty much like 
another, and I had my gar­dens to look after, so I stayed with grandpa. Besides, 
I had to - " Destry abruptly stopped. They were nearing the site of the new 
houses, and he called loudly. "Din­ner!" and watched the villagers swarm off 
their scaf­folds and beams. He took one of the baskets and scooted away to hand 
it around.
The food from the Homeward's culture units was distributed, and the villagers 
ate it with polite thanks, but without much enthusiasm; only the children seemed 
to enjoy the elaborate synthetics, and even the Homeward's crew seemed to have 
lost their taste for it. Brian, sitting on a half - finished wooden step and 
munch­ing absent - mindedly, abruptly made a face and flung the cake into the 
grass. Ellie cooked better, he de­cided, without the food machines. She liked 
the primi­tive cooking, and he had to admit she did it well. Still he felt 
disquieted. The food culture units synthesized their food out of a raw carbon, 
water, and almost infinitesimal amounts of raw chemicals; the whole pro­cess of 
growing food seemed, to Brian, wasteful and inefficient. It took so much time. 
Of course, he re­flected, it was pleasant, outdoor work, and the people who did 
it seemed to enjoy it. It wasn't so confining as standing over the machines, and 
you didn't grow so deathly bored, month after month, with nothing to do except 
push a lever now and then, and between the lever-pushings, scan films and play 
endlessly compli­cated mental games. Brian had been expert at a cer­tain three - 
dimensional board game which had to be played with the aid of an electronic 
computation de­vice; now he felt a curiously disloyal thought that his 
proficiency had been born of boredom. When you enjoyed your work, he thought, 
you didn't have to invent things to do in your spare time.
But I enjoyed my work, he told himself in confu­sion, I enjoyed working on the 
IS units.
Didn't I?
Furiously scattering the remaining synthetics on his disposable plate, he 
crumpled up the bit of plastic and flung it angrily away, grabbing up his tools 
- the new hammer, plane and level which the village smith had made in exchange 
for roofing a chicken - house and repairing his cellar steps - and shouted to 
Caldwell.
"Come on, let's get back at work, I want to get this floor laid by sundown!" He 
walked catlike across the empty beams, squatted where he had left off, and began 
sliding boards into place and nailing them with fierce, angrily precise blows.
He was still tersely angry and short - worded when, a few weeks later, he walked 
down through the village, a box in his hands. The houses were completed now, 
even to the steps, although still scantily furnished - Brian was still working, 
after each day's work, helping Caldwell build furniture.
He turned in at one still - raw, trampled muddy lawn, where brief spikes of 
summer grass were just begin­ning to peep through the wet earth, and knocked 
roughly.
Paula, a loose hand - woven smock wrapped about her body - she was beginning to 
grow clumsy and heavy now - opened the door, and her squinted, drawn face 
relaxed suddenly in a quick impulsive smile which made Brian feel ashamed and 
almost defensive.
"Brian - yes, Ellie's here, but - " She paused, hesi­tant, then invited shyly, 
"Won't you come in for a few minutes? We don't see much of you."
"I came down to see Tom - " Brian said uneasily, and followed Paula into the 
large reddish - lighted room. Before the fireplace he saw, to his intense 
dismay, that not only Ellie was there with Tom Mellen, but Langdon and Judy, 
Marcia and Don Isaacs, Destry, and - Hard Frobisher. Frobisher! It seemed that 
Hard Frobisher was continually underfoot, as if the crew of the Homeward needed 
his continual surveillance, assis­tance, advice! Brian frowned in annoyance; 
Frobisher acted like a self - appointed guardian to the newcomers. Yet it was 
impossible not to like the old fellow, even when he inquired genially, "And what 
have you in that big, interesting box, Mr. Kearns?"
"Just more of our top - heavy science," Brian said rudely, and undoing the box, 
took from it several pairs of red - lensed glasses in bent - plastic frames. He 
handed one pair to Mellen and donned one himself. "Turn out these lights, and 
see if these help any in the sun, will you?"
Tom looked at the glasses, puzzled, for a moment, then hooked the frames behind 
his ears and switched out the red lights, stepping to the west door and look­ing 
into the setting sun. Then he turned, grinning.
"They work, all right! What did you do, Brian? Just red glass wouldn't work - 
remember, we tried it?"
Brian shrugged. "There's a polarized layer inside. I couldn't find selenium, so 
I used an oxide of gold for the red color. It's a thin quartz filter ... oh, 
never mind. I'd have had them before, but it took a damned long time to grind 
them."
Langdon took a pair from the box. "That's right," he said slowly. "I remember, 
Miguel Kearns made lenses for some of the old Starward instruments, when they 
broke, and when we were duplicating instruments for the strip. Did you help 
him?"
"Some," Brian returned. He met Frobisher's eyes, and said truculently, "So you 
have no use for science. Well, as you pointed out yourself, it's a free country, 
and my crew have been going around with sore eyes -  and I don't like it!"
Paula's strained face relaxed as she slipped the filter glasses over her eyes, 
and she smiled. "This is wonder­ful, Brian," she said, and Ellie's face glowed 
with pride. Langdon mocked in a friendly voice, "The old fellow's human after 
all!" and flung a companionable arm around Brian's shoulders. "When are you and 
Ellie going to come down off your lofty peak and live with the rest of the 
pack?"
Brian stiffened, but the tone of approbation warmed him, and he came back, half 
- unwilling, to the fire­place, and listened to Frobisher, who said, laughing 
faintly, "It isn't science itself we don't like. It's the use of science as an 
end in itself, rather than a means. I mentioned a brontosaurus. I assume you 
know what that is?"
"We had them, alive, on Terra Two - or something like them. They're big, but not 
dangerous - they're too dumb," Brian told him.
"Exactly," Frobisher said. "But they're not much good to themselves, are they?" 
He smiled; then his face sobered. "The brontosaurus, with his titanic body - 
mass, had outgrown the logical use of a development which had, originally, been 
good and useful. Science," he proceeded, "was developed to make life easier for 
man. The individual man. The light body - armor of the Barbarian soldier was 
developed for more formidable weapons, and finally the armor had to be so 
cumber­some that the armored man must be lifted on his horse with a derrick. And 
if he fell down - well, there he was. It helped along the army, as a unit - but 
it cer­tainly made life a mess, for the individual. And sci­ence gave so much 
time and thought to units - the Nation, the Race, Humanity - as - a - Whole - 
that it laid terrific burdens on humanity as individuals. To benefit the monster 
of Humanity - as - a - Whole, they even fought wars - which killed off humanity, 
individually, at a fearful rate. Eventually - well, the knight fell down inside 
his armor, and couldn't get up again. I think the collapse started even before 
the Starward left. The brontosaurus died along with his protective nuisances, 
but nature was a little kinder to men - individually. Humanity - as - a - Whole 
died out pretty thoroughly, even as a concept. The individuals who were left 
knew enough not to start the whole dreary process all over again. Science took 
its rightful place with the other arts and crafts - instead of using it to serve 
a hypothet­ical whole, we use each art, or science, to enrich the personal, 
private life of each individual." He gestured around the room. "The sawmill and 
pottery. Tom's red lighting in here. And - your red - lensed glasses, Brian. I 
think the time has come when I can tell you why - "
But Brian had already risen, and flung away from him.
"I didn't come down here to be lectured!" he shouted at Frobisher, and strode to 
the door. "There are the glasses, Tom. You hand them out. Tell everybody not to 
break them; they take forever to grind."
The door slammed behind him.
Now that he had defied Frobisher, he felt a little better, but as the days came 
and went, he felt tor­mented by the uselessness of his life. He spent more and 
more time in vicious, expert hammering and sawing - in solitude, now - at 
furniture, finding a sort of satisfaction in substituting physical activity for 
insol­uble mental problems; Ellie never dared to broach the subject of moving 
away from the Homeward again, until one night when Brian was sitting hunched 
over in the former lounge, listlessly watching Einstein clamber around the axis 
beams. The Centaurian cat's suckers were not strong enough to support his 
weight, in this gravity; he had developed a queer shambling gait on his hind 
feet, amusing to watch, but clumsy and pain­ful, and Ellie picked up her pet and 
patted him as she passed through the lounge.
"Poor Einstein doesn't know what to make of this," she observed. "Gravity, in 
here where there ought to be no gravity at all. He'd be happier in a regular 
house."
"I suppose so," Brian said sourly. "I suppose you would too. But look, Ellie; 
the crew would dismantle the ship inside a year or two."
"Well, why not let them?" Ellie asked, matter-of-factly.
Brian shrugged, helplessly. "I suppose, sooner or later - but still, some day 
Terra Two will go out into space again, too - they haven't reverted to 
savagery!"
Ellie only smiled. "It won't happen in our lifetime."
"You're worse than the others!" Brian shouted in sudden furious anger. She only 
murmured uncritically, "Come in and have dinner."
Brian morosely rose and followed her. He had to edge by a machine, suddenly 
stumbled over Einstein, and exploded violently, "It's too damn cramped in here!"
Ellie did not answer, and Brian finally said, "I suppose - it won't happen - in 
our lifetime, no."
"What are you going to do then, pass this great secret on to your sons?" Ellie' 
inquired, and Brian started to answer before apprehending the dry irony in her 
voice. It had taken him twelve years to learn even the basics of interstellar 
operation.
He applied himself grimly to his food; but his mood softened as he ate, and he 
finally looked up and said, "Frobisher can like it or not, but I'll make a 
scientist out of Destry yet. The kid's always underfoot. Ever since you taught 
me to fly the pickup - I took him up one day, and let him take the controls for 
a few minutes; they aren't very complicated." He spoke with a sort of 
satisfaction; it was a point of self - respect in his continual struggle to 
maintain himself in Frobisher's presence. "The boy's nuts on airplanes. He must 
have read a lot in old books."
Ellie asked suddenly, "I wonder what Destry's fa­ther is like?"
Brian scoffed, "He makes rugs!"
Ellie looked unconvinced. "Maybe he makes the rugs the way Frobisher paints 
those birds he has all over the house. Look what I found in Frobisher's 
bookcase. Destry loaned it to me when I asked him." She handed him a book, 
nicely handbound in red cloth. Brian opened it curiously, skipping over the name 
- John D. Frobisher - penned neatly on the cover. He had seen few books in 
Norten village, and those were mostly blank - books filled with recipes, musical 
notations, or diaries - diary - keeping was a favorite pas­time among young 
people here. But this was printed, and filled with elaborate, exquisitely 
reproduced dia­grams which reminded Brian of Judy's scrawls when she was working 
out a wiring diagram. He tried to read a page or two, but, although the language 
was only loosely technical, Brian's education had been so rigidly specialized 
that the vocabulary was beyond him. He shut it up, and asked, "Did you show this 
to Judy?"
"Yes. It's a text, she says, on radio and radar, and not an elementary one 
either."
"Funny ..." Brian mused.
"Here's something funnier," Ellie said. "Have you seen Caldwell lately? Or 
Marcia and Don Isaacs?"
"Come to think of it, I haven't. I never saw much of Don, though - "
"They went away, that night you and Frobisher had a fight. Marcia told me they 
were going so that Don could work in another village. That's what they always 
say - like Destry's father. People seem to come and go, here, all the time! 
Almost every day, somebody picks up a clean shirt and a pair of stockings, and 
walks off down the road. And nobody sees him again for three or four months - 
then he walks in again, as casually as I do when I go down to Paula's and back!"
"And the standard of living ..." Brian mused, "com­fortable enough - but 
primitive - "
Ellie laughed. "Oh, Brian! We were happy enough on Terra Two, without quite so 
much. The ship is super - mechanized. We're spoiled - we've developed a lot of 
artificial wants - "
"Frobisher converting you, too?" he asked glumly.
Her laugh was gay. "Maybe."
Brian was silent, staring at the book. He felt trapped. It was an insidious 
poison, the temptation to relax, rest, dream and die in this - Ellie had called 
it Arcadia, but a fragment of poetry from an old book in the ship's library 
teased his brain; not Arcadia, he thought drearily, but the isle of the lotus 
eaters, who tasted the poison flower and forgot all that they had been before. 
...
The words of the ancient poet sang insidiously in his brain. He rose and fetched 
the book from behind a panel in the lounge, and sat with it on his knees, the 
words of defeat staring him in the face.
Hateful is the dark - blue sky,
Vaulted o'er the dark - blue sea;
Death is the end of life; ah, why
Should life all labor be?
Let us alone; Time driveth onward fast. ...
How could a man who had mastered space live like this, in animal content, year 
after year? He wondered if among the lotus eaters there had been anyone who had 
refused the poison - and finally eaten it from star­vation, or because he could 
not endure the loneliness of being the only sane man among a crew abandoned to 
their dreams?
Let us alone . . . what pleasure can we have To war with evil? Is there any 
peace In ever climbing up the climbing wave? Give us long rest or death, dark 
death or dreamful ease . . .
Brian scowled and let the book fall to the floor. There was nothing easy about 
life in Norten! In the last few days, weeks, months, he had worked harder than 
ever in his life. His hands, once sensitive and smooth, alert to the quiver of a 
lever, were hard and callused and brown. And yet there was something satisfying 
about it. He no longer found himself invent­ing elaborate leisure - time 
pursuits, no longer felt im­pelled by continual anxiety about his crew, lest 
some minor infringement of a rule should lead to catastro­phe. And Ellie - he 
had Ellie, and that, if nothing else, was something to hold him here.
And yet - after he had crossed space - his body thrived, but his brain was 
starving. Or was it, he asked himself. He'd gotten almost as much satisfaction - 
the guilty thought came - out of seeing his crew's eyes get well again, with the 
special glasses he'd made, as he had in piloting the Homeward safely through a 
danger­ous cloud of radioactive gas. Maybe - again the guilt -  maybe more.
The glasses. But they couldn't go around wearing red goggles for the rest of 
their lives. There ought to be some way of gradually altering the filters, maybe 
at monthly intervals, so that they became gradually ac­customed to the light. He 
pulled a stylus toward him, vainly rummaged for a loose sheet of paper, then 
irritably climbed into his old control room, searched, and at last slid open the 
moving panel over the log book. His hands hesitated at the vandalism, then he 
shrugged and swore - the voyage was finished, the log book closed out! He ripped 
a blank sheet from the back, sat down then and there on the edge of the skyhook, 
and began to sketch out, roughly, a plan for glasses with changeable filters.
The yellow dawn was a glare in the sky when he finally came down; Ellie was 
sleeping in the cabin, her curly hair scattered over her face, and he quietly 
tip­toed past her and down the ladder. The air was cold and clear, and he 
stretched and yawned, suddenly realizing that he was very sleepy.
Against the brightening sky, a man's form was sil­houetted as he gradually came 
over the knoll, and Tom Mellen called to him, "Is that you, Brian?" and came 
toward him with swinging strides. He had long ago discarded the shorts and 
sandals of the ship in favor of boots and long dyed breeches, and he wore one of 
his uniform shirts tucked into them. The ship's synthetics were not long - 
wearing or practical, although they were simply produced, but a few of the 
younger women in Norten had liked the thin pretty stuff, and exchanged lengths 
of it for the sturdier and more practical hand - made variety.
As he came near, Brian asked him, "Where are you going so early?"
"I'm going to work awhile in another town," Tom told him casually. "I've a 
letter to a friend of Frobisher's. I came up to ask a favor. I don't suppose 
Ellie's up yet? Well, don't bother her, but - " He paused, then added, "I meant 
for Paula to come along with me. But she's not very well, and she doesn't want 
to be with strangers. She'd particularly miss Ellie. But I hate to have her 
alone - "
Brian said abruptly, "Tom, we're going to move down into the village. I've - " 
He glanced around at the Homeward and all his pent - up resentment sud­denly 
spilled over and he shouted, "I'm tired of care - taking the damned old - 
brontosaurus! I'm through!"
Tom whistled. "What's gotten into you? I thought you were dedicated to 
maintaining a nice snug little island of culture." Then at Brian's expression, 
the sarcasm left his voice, and he said eagerly, "Brian, if you mean that, why 
don't you and Ellie move down with Paula while I'm gone? I'll be back before the 
baby comes, and we can get started on a house for you two."
Brian stood thinking it over for a minute, and finally nodded. "All right. I'm 
sure Ellie will want to; she worries about Paula."
Tom stood looking at the ground. "Well, I'll shove along and tell Paula to 
expect you and then I'll get on my way." He paused, then said, low - voiced, 
"Brian - I thought, on the ship, you were just throwing your rank, about - well, 
about the girls. But now - " He stopped again, and said finally, embarrassed, 
"You know the baby was - started - before we landed?"
"I guessed that," Brian said coldly.
"I thought it was all right because we'd be landing within a month or two. But 
now - and the change in gravity, I'm afraid - if Paula and I had had the sense 
to wait - Judy's pregnant, you know, and she's not having any trouble at all, 
while Paula - " He stopped, and finally got out, "I guess I owe you an apology, 
Brian."
"You might better apologize to Paula," Brian said, but he had appreciated the 
spirit in which Tom spoke. So Tom finally realized that Brian had a good reason 
for what he'd done!
Tom added quietly, "I owe an apology for some­thing else, too, Brian. It's my 
fault they've been leav­ing you out of things around here. I had the idea you 
were still trying to rehabilitate the natives."
"Don't bother apologizing," Brian said frigidly. So Tom had missed the point 
after all! "I'm not particu­larly interested in 'things around here,' and sooner 
or later I expect the natives will need rehabilitating, as you put it. When that 
day comes, I'll be here."
Mellen's mouth hardened. "I guess Frobisher's right about you!" he said tightly. 
"So long, then." He put out his hand, rather unwillingly, and Brian shook it, 
without enthusiasm. He watched as Tom descended the hill, wondering where he was 
going and why. Was it just part of the local irresponsibility? Tom was 
irre­sponsible anyhow - the way he'd behaved toward Paula was shameful. And who, 
here, was going to look after her? The local witch - doctor? He scowled, and 
went in to tell Ellie about their impending move.
 
VIII
 
Paula was almost pathetically grateful for Ellie's company, and even Einstein 
settled down near the new fireplace as cozily as any of the ordinary Norton cats 
with whom he had a continual feud. Brian located a site for the house he 
intended to build and, aided by Destry, began a rough workshop of fieldstone. In 
re­turn for the boy's help, Brian took him, nightly, into the dome of the 
Homeward and taught him the names and positions of the fixed stars. The boy was 
filling a blank - book with astronomical data; Brian offered to present him with 
one of the astronomy texts dupli­cated in the ship, but Destry politely refused 
the gift. "I like to make my own. That way I'm sure of what's in it," he 
explained.
Brian himself was painstakingly perfecting his lens - grinding equipment. The 
workshop had gradually be­come his refuge and, now that he knew he was working 
on something which was worth doing, he slowly began to come out of the closed 
shell he had originally thrown about himself, forbidding intimacy with the life 
of the village. He relaxed from the painstaking lens - grinding by beginning 
something he had not done since his early teens; glass - blowing. He made a set 
of fancy bottles for Ellie, and when Judy admired them, made one for her as 
well. Both Ellie and Judy had many friends in the village, and within a few 
weeks Brian found that so many men and women were asking him to make them that 
he could switch his full - time work from carpentry to glass - making. There was 
a potter in the village, who made extremely fine crockery, but at present the 
local glass - maker was - again the omni­present phrase - "working in another 
village." Brian found the work congenial, and felt that he had approval. 
However, privately, anxiety piled on anxiety. He actually saw very little of 
Paula, for there was still a certain stiffness between them; however, he felt 
dis­turbed at her obvious weakness. Ellie, too, was ex­pecting a child by now, 
although as yet she had told no one but him, and Paula's condition filled him 
with panic for Ellie.
There had not been a medical man on the Homeward: none of them had ever been 
ill. Marcia had nominally been responsible for their health % but even Marcia 
wasn't here now. And judging from what little talk Brian had heard here in 
Norten, it was simply a matter of any woman's helping out when asked. Ellie had 
vigorously defended the system when Brian attacked it, protesting that having 
children was a natural func­tion, and that the medical and surgical atmosphere 
with which the Terra Two colony surrounded it was enough to make any woman 
neurotic. Brian was un­convinced; that might be true when everything was normal, 
but Paula definitely needed care. He won­dered how Ellie could be so 
unconcerned; Paula was her closest friend.
But even Brian was not prepared for the suddenness with which mere anxiety 
turned to disaster. At noon that day Paula was her usual self: pale and 
pathetically heavy of step, but gay and bright - eyed. In the evening she was 
quieter than usual, and went to bed early. And some time during the night Brian 
was roused by Elite's hand on his shoulder and her scared voice: "Brian - wake 
up!"
Brian drew himself upright, instantly alert, seeing Ellie's tensely drawn face 
and hearing the near - hysteria in her voice. "It's Paula - I've never seen 
anything like it - she was all right this evening - oh, Brian, please come!"
Brian pulled a robe about his shoulders, thinking, what could have happened so 
suddenly? He heard the low, incessant moans even before he stepped into the 
inner room and stopped, aghast at Paula's face. It was altogether drained of 
color; even the lips were white and sunken, but a curious dark line marred their 
edges. She had always been excessively thin, but now her hands seemed suddenly 
shrunken into claws, and when Brian touched one, it was fire - hot. Brian cast 
his mind rapidly over what little he had been taught about the relationship of 
gravity and pregnancy - just enough to know that hi free fall, a dangerous 
condition could develop suddenly. He wished he had known" more, but they had 
taught him just enough that he was thor­oughly convinced of the wisdom of 
enforcing strict celibacy hi spaceship personnel. His brain, strictly 
spe­cialized for one limited aspect of science, retained only a few fragments of 
knowledge. They fluttered and teased at the edge of his mind: imperfect 
placental junction without the cohesive effect of gravity, hor­mone malfunction 
under the added strain of preg­nancy, extensive damage to internal tissues - all 
this was at free fall conditions. But what about Paula, who was adapted to the 
light gravity of Terra Two, whose child had actually been conceived hi free 
fall, and who was being brutally punished by the dragging gravity of Earth? 
Something in the delicate balance of cohesions had evidently kicked loose. Brian 
looked down at the unconscious girl and spoke violently.
"Damn Mellen for an insubordinate idiot!" "Where's Tom?" Paula whispered 
rackingly. "I want Tom!" The feverish bony fingers clutched at Brian's, and she 
begged, "I want Tom!" Her eyes opened, but she was looking past Brian into 
space. Brian felt the old cold anger knotting inside him. He bent over and 
promised quietly, "I'll get him."
Ellie whispered, "But - I don't know where he's gone, Brian. Paula might be - "
Brian straightened savagely. "I'll find him if I have to take my fists to 
Frobisher! Thank God we still have the pickup! And I'll find out where Don and 
Marcia were sent; yes, sent! All along I've had the feeling - "
"Brian - " Ellie caught at his hand, but he pushed her away. "Frobisher's going 
to listen to me for once! He can damn science all he wants to. But if Paula dies 
on our hands because nobody on this dark - ages planet knows what to do for her, 
then by the living God I'm going to personally raise such hell in this god - 
forsaken little Utopia of theirs that Frobisher and his pals will snap out of 
their daydream and start living like human beings again!" Without another word 
he strode out of the room, dressed hastily and went out of the house, his long - 
repressed anger boiling up and stiffening his back as he hurried toward the 
village. He went up Frobisher's steps and across his porch at a single bound, 
thrust the door open without knocking, and stormed inside.
"Frobisher!" he bellowed unceremoniously.
In the darkness there was a surprised noise; then steps, a door flung open and a 
light shining in Brian's eyes - and Hard Frobisher, half - dressed, came swiftly 
into the main room. Another opening door showed the half - naked Destry, 
surprised and angry. Frobisher's face, dim in the firelight, was surprised, too, 
but there was no anger, and he asked calmly, "Is something wrong?"
And as always, his calm brought Brian's anger to the exploding point. "You're 
right there's something wrong," he raged, and advanced on Frobisher so 
vio­lently that the old man retreated a step or two. "I've got a girl on my 
hands who looks as if she were going to die," Brian roared, "And I want to know 
where on this devil - ridden planet you packed Tom off to, and where Marcia's 
gone! And then I want to know if there's a decent medical man anywhere in this 
damned backward dark - ages Utopia of yours!"
Frobisher's face swiftly lost its calm.
"Tom's wife?"
"And there's no need to talk smut!" Brian shouted, "Paula!"
"Paula Sandoval, then, if you like it better. What's the trouble?"
"I doubt if you'd understand," Brian snapped, but Frobisher said steadily, "I 
suppose it's the gravity sick­ness. Tom mentioned it before he left. It's easy 
to get hold of him. Destry - " He turned to the boy in the doorway. "Quick, go 
down and get the Center on the wire. Tell them to fly Mellen back here, inside 
an hour if they can. And -  - where's your father, Destry? This sounds like 
something for him."
Destry had disappeared inside his room while his grandfather was talking; almost 
instantly he came out again, stuffing his shirt into trousers. "He was in the 
Marilla Center last week, too," Destry said quickly, "but he's in Slayton now. 
And there's no regular tran­sit plane there. Hey, Mr. Kearns - " He turned 
quickly to Brian. "You can fly the Homeward's plane now, can't you? Or shall we 
get Langdon? They'll fly Tom in from the Marilla Center, but we'll have to fly 
over and pick up my father."
"What the - what the hell!" Brian started, but Destry was already hurrying down 
a flight of stairs. Hard Frobisher put a compulsive hand on Brian's shoul­der 
and shoved him after the boy. Brian stumbled on the steps and blinked in the raw 
light of an electric arc bulb. On a rough wood workbench, with Destry's 
notebooks and a few ordinary boy - type oddments, the stupefied Brian recognized 
what was unmistakably a radio transmitter. And not a simple one. Destry was 
already adjusting earphones and making a careful cali­bration of an instrument 
which looked handmade but incredibly delicate. He moved a key and said in a 
hurried voice, "Marilla Center, please, second - class priority, personal. Hello 
- Betty? You've got a man in the Center working on radio? Mellen? That's the 
man. This is Destry Frobisher talking from Norten. Fly him over here - as fast 
as you can make it. His wife's ill - yes, I know, but it's a special case. 
Thanks - " A long pause. "Thanks again, but we'll manage. Look, Betty, I have to 
get Slayton. Clear the stations, will you?" Another pause, and he said, "My 
father. Why? Oh - thanks, Betty, thanks a lot. Tell them we'll bring a plane 
over there for him." He closed the key and ripped off the headphone, standing 
up, and Brian exploded again.
"Just what's going on?" he demanded. "What kind of a bluff have you people been 
putting up on us?"
"No bluff," Frobisher said calmly. "I've told you, all along, that we use 
science, in its proper place. I've tried to tell you, two or three times, but 
you always shouted at me and shut me up before I could explain. Tom Mellen has 
been working in one of the Centers for a month. Didn't you wonder why he wasn't 
wor­ried about leaving Paula, in her state of health? He's known that if any 
serious complication developed, he'd be sent for right away." He turned and 
started toward the stairs. "Don't you realize this is the first time you've ever 
shown the slightest personal concern for anyone or anything? Before this, you've 
been con­cerned with scientific accomplishments for their own sake. Now look, 
you can stand here staring like a brainless fool, or you can come with me to the 
Center to fetch my son - Destry's father - who is one of the most skillful 
medical men in this section." As Brian stood stone still, unable to move before 
the onslaught of ideas, Frobisher urgently took his arm. "Snap out of it!" he 
commanded harshly. "I can fly a plane, but I would hate to have to manage that 
jet of yours! And I'll have to come with you, because you don't know the way! 
Destry, you stay close to the radio, just in case," he added.
Brian, too dazed to speak, stumbled with him across the dark fields toward the 
pickup, but by the time they reached it, his reactions were in operable 
condition; he climbed in at the controls, advised Frobisher to fasten a safety 
strap, put the pickup in the air, and listened intelligently to Frobisher's 
instructions for reaching the place he called Slayton Center. Then he turned his 
head.
"Look," he said grimly, "I'm a little stunned. Just what has been going on?"
Frobisher looked equally puzzled. "What do you mean?"
"All this - "
"Oh, this!" Frobisher dismissed it with a shrug. "You had fire extinguishers on 
your spaceship, I re­member. Did you keep them out on your dinner ta­bles, or 
did you leave them out of sight until they were needed in a hurry?"
"I mean - you let me go on thinking that people here didn't know much about 
science - "
"Listen, Kearns," Frobisher said abruptly, "you've been jumping to conclusions 
all along. Now don't jump to another one, that we've been bluffing, and 
conceal­ing our civilization from you. We live the way we like to live."
"But radio - planes - you have all those things, and yet - "
Frobisher said, with barely concealed disgust, "You have the Barbarian 
viewpoint, I see. .Radio, for in­stance. We use it for emergency needs. The 
Barbar­ians used to listen to keep from doing things - I know, they even had 
radio with pictures, and used to sit and listen and look at other people doing 
things instead of doing them themselves. Of course, they led rather primitive 
lives - "
"Primitive! Brian interrupted. "You have airplanes, and yet people walk - "
Frobisher said irritably, "Why not? Where is there to go in such a hurry - as 
long as we have fast trans­port for those few times when it is really 
necessary?"
"But even when the Starward left, each man had his own private copter - "
"Private baby carriage!" Frobisher snorted. "When I go anywhere, I go on my feet 
like a man! Stupid, primitive Barbarians, living huddled in cities like big
mechanical caves, never seeing the world they lived in, hidden away behind glass 
and steel and seeing their world on television screens and through airplane 
win­dows! And to make all those things they had to live huddled in their caves 
and do dirty smelly jobs with metal nuts and bolts, and never see what they were 
doing, never have any pride or skill - they lived like dirty animals! And what 
for? Mass men for mass production - to produce things they didn't need, to have 
money to buy other things they didn’t need! Top - heavy brontosaurs! Who wants 
to live that way, or do that kind of work? There are a few craftsmen who build 
airplanes, or design them, because that's what they would rather do, and they'd 
be unhappy if they couldn't. They're artisans. And we can always use a few 
planes. But there aren't many, so we keep the planes for necessary work. And 
most people like doing simpler things, things with personal satisfaction. We 
don't force them to mass - produce airplanes simply because it's possible!" He 
checked his vehemence with an almost apologetic cough. "I didn't mean to get 
angry - that's the Slayton Center down there. You can land inside that rectangle 
of lights."
Brian set the pickup down easily - it seemed to be rolling over a velvety carpet 
- and they got down and walked in silence, across the darkly luxuriant grass, 
toward a low frame building of dark wood. Inside, by the warm glow of a 
fireplace, a man sat at a large table, lighted by an expertly rigged system of 
minia­ture spotlights, looking down at what appeared to be a large relief map. A 
headphone was on his ears; he glanced up as they came through the door, but 
mo­tioned them into silence, listening intently, and after a moment groped 
blindly into a box fixed on the side of the desk and came out with a large black 
pin which he stabbed accurately into the relief map. "Tornado re­ported between 
Carney and Marilla. All right, then, ring off and send Robinson up to put a bomb 
in the center of it before it hits the farms out that way." He
replaced the headphone, and inquired courteously. "What can I do for you 
gentlemen?"
"Hello, Halleck," Hard Frobisher said, and, ad­vancing to the desk, shook hands 
with the man, "This is Brian Kearns - came in from space."
"Oh, are they still coming in, down your way? The last one we had here was in my 
grandfather's time," the man Halleck observed casually. "No, come to think of 
it, down there in Marilla they have a man called Mellen, been working the 
weather station. Do you know him, Mr. Kearns? I'm glad to meet you."
Brian murmured something noncommittal, and looked around, dazed. Halleck added, 
"I suppose you came to pick up Dr. Frobisher? He's on his way over. Won't you 
sit down?"
"Thanks." Frobisher sank down in a comfortable armchair, motioned Brian into 
another. The man at the desk hung up his headset and came to stand by 
Frobisher's chair. "Good to see you, Hard. When do you come up here again?"
"Not for a month or so. You'll be off by then?"
"I should say so! I've a couple of good cows carving, and I want to be home."
"Those blacks?" Frobisher asked. "Drive a few through Norten some day, and we'll 
see if we can't make a deal. I could use a good bull, and there are some new 
families with children, could use a milk cow."
Brian didn't try to follow the conversation after that; it seemed to be mostly 
about cows and the luck a mutual friend was having in breeding chickens which 
laid black - shelled eggs. Frobisher finally took pity on his blank face. "He's 
never been at a Center, before, Halleck," he told the stranger, who grinned. 
"Pretty dull, aren't they, Mr. Kearns? I'm always glad to come up here when it's 
time, but I'm always glad to get back to the farm."
Brian said, "I'm a little stunned at all this - " and added, "I'd understood 
your - your civilization wasn't scientific - "
"It isn't," Frobisher said sternly. "It definitely is not. We use science; it 
doesn't use us. Science, Mr. Kearns, is no longer the plaything of powerful 
war­mongers, nor is it enslaved to an artificial standard of living, keyed to an 
unhealthy, neurotic population who want to be continually amused, rocked in a 
cradle of overstimulation! It is not playing for pressure groups, so - called 
educators, fanatics, adolescents, egocentric ex­hibitionists, or lazy women! Men 
are no longer under pressure to buy the products of commercialized sci­ence to 
create employment and keep the cities run­ning. Anyone who's interested, and who 
has talents and skills which go beyond day - to - day living, which is more than 
half of the population, spends a few months every year doing the things which 
need doing, not just in science. Halleck here knows more about weather 
conditions than anyone else in the South Plains. About four months out of the 
year, he sits over there, or works out in a weather plane, fighting tornados 
before they get started, working on reforestation, handling drought conditions. 
The rest of the year, he lives like anybody else. Everybody lives an easy, 
balanced life. Man's a small animal, and has to have a small horizon. There's a 
definite limit to his horizon, which is why a village breaks down and starts 
having internal trouble when it gets too big. But groups of people, as a whole, 
have to have some idea of the world over the horizon, if they're going to avoid 
the development of false ideas, superstitions and fears of strangers. So every 
man leads a secure, balanced life in the small horizon of his village, where he 
is responsible for himself, and responsible to every person he knows - and also, 
if he is capable, he lives a larger life beyond the village, working for others 
- but still and always for individuals, not for ideals." Brian opened his mouth 
to speak, but Frobisher quietly forestalled him. "And before he can work in the 
Centers, he has to prove himself as a responsible individual in the villages. 
There's a place waiting for you, Brian. How would you like to teach a course in 
the mechanics of interstellar space?"
"What?" Brian spluttered. "You mean - space tra­vel?"
Frobisher laughed heartily. He glanced at his watch and said inconsequentially, 
"My son will probably be here in a few minutes - but still, I've time to explain 
- "
He turned to Brian again. "For two or three months a year," he reminded him. 
"There is always a use for knowledge, whether we can use it immediately or not. 
Our present way of life won't endure forever. At best it's an interim device, a 
probationary period, a sort of resting stage while man returns to sanity before 
he starts climbing again. Some day, man will probably take to space again, even 
the stars, but this time, we hope he'll do it with a sense of perspective, 
counting the cost and weighing it against individual advantages." He paused, and 
added quietly, "I think he will."
After a long silence, he added, "I'm a historian. Back in the First Renaissance, 
man was starting to outgrow his atavistic notion about survival of the strong 
and powerful instead of the best. Then, unluckily for Europe, and also unluckily 
for the Redmen, the so - called New World was discovered. It's always easier to 
escape across a frontier, and drive your misfits out instead of learning to live 
with your problems. When that frontier was finally conquered, man had a second 
chance to learn to live with himself and with what he'd done. Instead, after 
wars and all kinds of trouble, he escaped again, this time to the planets. But 
he couldn't escape from himself - and eventually that frontier was filled up to 
the saturation point, too. So he escaped again, this time by launching the 
Starward -   but that time he went just one step too far. And then the crash 
came. Every man had the choice: die in his armor, or take it off." He grinned. 
"I thought for a while, Brian, that you were a brontosaur."
Brian mopped his forehead. "I feel pretty extinct," he murmured.
"Well, you can try teaching interstellar mechanics for awhile. The rest of the 
time - "
"Say - " Brian interrupted anxiously. "I don't have to start right away, do I? 
I'm fixing up a new set of lenses for the crew - "
Frobisher laughed, heartily and kindly, and put a hand on his shoulder. "Take 
your own time, my boy. The stars won't be bridged again for centuries. It's a 
lot more important to get your crew's eyes in good condition again." He rose 
abruptly. "Good - here is John, and I suppose by now, Mellen's on his way to 
Paula."
Brian quickly got to his feet as a tall dark - haired man in a white jacket came 
into the room. Even in the dim light the resemblance to Frobisher was obvious; 
he looked like an older, maturer Destry. Frobisher introduced the men, and Dr. 
John Frobisher gave Brian's hand a quick, warm hand shake.
"Glad to meet you, Kearns. Tom Mellen spoke about you, last time I was in 
Manila. Shall we be on our way?" As they turned outward, and crossed the lighted 
airfield, he and his father spoke in low tones, and for once Brian had nothing 
to say. Even his thoughts were not working as he put the pickup in the air. The 
reversal had been too fast. Then, abruptly, a memory hit him and he turned his 
head around to ask sharply, "Listen here, if you can receive radio signals, how 
is it that no one answered the Homeward's call from space!"
Frobisher looked a trifle embarrassed. He said gently, at last, "We use a 
special, tight - beam transmission. Your signals are the old wide - band ones, 
and they came in as bursts of static."
For some reason Brian felt incredibly relieved, and his relief exploded in 
laughter.
"I told Tom our radio devices would be obsolete. . ." he choked.
"Yes," Frobisher said quietly. "Obsolete, only in a way you hadn't planned for. 
The whole crew of the Homeward was obsolete - and you've been on proba­tion all 
along. But you've come out of that now, I think. Wait a bit - don't go to Norten 
just yet. Turn north - just a mile or two. There's something I want you to see."
Brian protested, "Paula - "
John Frobisher leaned forward. "Mellen's wife - " and this time Brian did not 
bridle at the vulgarism, " - will be all right, Kearns. We don't get the gravity 
sickness very often, now, but any danger in it was knocked out even before the 
spacers quit running. The girl's probably uncomfortable, and it looks terrible, 
but it isn't dangerous. We'll have her fixed up within an hour."
And somehow Brian's anxiety slid away. The words didn't mean much to him, but 
his training had taught him one thing, at least; he recognized competence when 
he met it, and it was in every inflection of John Frobisher's voice. 
Acquiescently he swung the skip to the northeast. The rising sun broke in a wave 
of bright­ness over the horizon, revealing the far - away line of ruined 
buildings that looked down drearily over a too - flat strip of dismal, barren 
land where nothing grew, a straight level plain of gray concrete. For miles it 
seemed to stretch away; Brian, flying low, could see the grass that pushed its 
way upward through the crumbling concrete, the dreary gap - windowed buildings 
softened a little by ivy. And then he saw them: eight tall regular shapes, 
straight and still gleaming a little. . . .
"There are only two laws in our culture," Frobisher said quietly. "One is that 
no man shall enslave an­other. And the second - " he paused, looking straight at 
Brian, " - is that no man shall enslave himself. Which is why we have never 
destroyed these ships. This was the old spaceport, Brian. Does it look very 
majestic? Would you care to land?"
Brian looked, thinking: this was what he had ex­pected to see first. And yet, 
somehow, this was what seemed greatest to him: that man, having created this 
monster, should have the common sense to abandon its dreary domination - and the 
courage to leave it there. Men destroy only what they fear.
"Come on," Brian said steadily. "Quit riding me.
Let's get back home - and I do mean home. There's a sick girl waiting for you, 
doctor. And even if it isn't dangerous, they're going to be worrying until you 
tell them it isn't." Abruptly he gunned the jets and turned the ship southeast 
toward Norten Village, into the rising sun. He was not aware that he had passed 
the final test. He was thinking about Paula, and about Ellie, waiting and 
worrying. He knew in the back of his mind that he'd come back here some day, 
look around a little, maybe even mourn a little; you couldn't put away the 
biggest part of your life. But he wouldn't come right away. He had work to do.
The pickup of the Homeward flew away, into the morning. Yet behind them the 
mighty symbols re­mained, cold and masterful, a promise and a threat: eight 
great starships, covered from nose to tail with green - growing moss and red 
rust.
(1955)
 
 
Exiles of Tomorrow
 
 
"A very strange thing happened when I was born," Carey Kennaird told me.
He paused and refilled his wine glass, looking at me with a curious appraisal in 
his young and very blue eyes. I returned his glance as casually as I could, 
wondering why he had suddenly decided to confide in me.
I had known Carey Kennaird for only a few weeks. We were the most casual of 
acquaintances; a word in the lobby of our hotel, a cup of coffee in a lunchroom 
he liked, mugs of beer in the quiet back room of the corner bar. He was 
intelligent and I had enjoyed his conversation. But until now it had consisted 
entirely of surface commonplaces. Today, he seemed to be open­ing up a trifle.
He had volunteered the information, unasked, that he was the son of a well - 
known research physicist, and that he was in Chicago to look for his father who 
had disappeared mysteriously a week or so before. Young Kennaird seemed oddly 
unworried about his father's plight. But I was pleased at the way his reserve 
ap­peared to be dropping.
As I say, Carey Kennaird had a casual way with him, and he puzzled me. He did 
not, somehow, seem emotionally in sympathy with the hectic tempo of the rushed 
age in which he had grown up.
"Well," I told him noncommitally, "childhood mem­ories often make quite normal 
events seem strange. What was it?"
The appraisal in his eyes was franker now. "Mr. Grayne, do you ever read science 
fiction?"
"I'm afraid not," I told him. "At least, only very occasionally."
He looked a little crestfallen. "Oh - well, do you know anything about the 
familiar science - fiction con­cept of traveling in time?"
"A little," I finished my drink, wishing the waiter would bring us another 
bottle of wine. "It's supposed to involve some quite staggering paradoxes, I 
believe. I'm thinking of the man who goes back in time and kills his own 
grandfather."
He looked disgusted. "That's at best a trite layman's idea!"
"Well, I'm a layman," I said genially. The arro­gance of young people always 
strikes me as being pathetic rather than insulting. I did not think young 
Kennaird could have been more than nineteen. Twenty, perhaps. "Now then, young 
fellow, don't tell me you've actually invented a time machine!"
"Good Lord, no!" The denial was so laughingly spontaneous that I had to laugh 
with him, "No, just an idea that interests me. I don't really believe there's 
much paradox involved in time - travel at all."
He paused, his eyes still on my face. "See here, Mr. Grayne, I'd like to - well, 
do you mind listening to something rather fantastic? I'm not drunk, but I've got 
a good reason for wanting to confide in you. You see, I know a great deal about 
you, really."
I wasn't surprised. In fact, I'd been prepared for just such a statement. I 
grinned a strained grin at the boy. "No, go ahead," I told him. "I'm 
interested." I leaned back in my chair, preparing to listen.
You see, I knew what he was going to say.
 
II
 
Ryn Kenner sat in his cell, his head buried in his hands.
"Oh, God - " he muttered to himself, over and over.
There were so many unpredictable risks involved. Even though he had spent three 
years coaching Cara, teaching her to guard against every possible contin­gency, 
he still might fail. If only he could have elimi­nated the psychic block. But 
that, of course, was the most necessary risk of all.
Sometimes, in spite of his humanitarian training, Ryn Kenner thought the old, 
primitive safeguards had been better. Executing murderers, locking maniacs up in 
cells was certainly better than exiling men in this horrible new way. Ryn Kenner 
knew that he would have preferred to die. Two or three times he had even thought 
of slashing his wrists with a razor before the Exile. Once he had actually set a 
razor against his right wrist, but his early training had been too strong for 
him. Even the word suicide could set off a mental com­plex of quivering nerve 
reactions impossible to control.
The tragedy, Kenner thought despondently, resided in the paradox that 
civilization had become too en­lightened. There had been a time when men had 
thought that traveling backward in time would upset the frame­work of events and 
change the future. But it had been a manifestly mistaken idea, for in this year, 
2543 a.d. the whole past had already occurred, and the present moment contained 
within itself the entire past, includ­ing whatever rectifying attempts time - 
travelers had made in that past.
Kenner shivered as he realized that his own acts had all occurred in the past. 
He, Ryn Kenner, had already died - six centuries before.
Time - travel - the perfect, the most humane way of banishing criminals! He had 
heard all the arguments which sophistry could muster. The strong individual­ists 
were clearly misfits in the enlightened twenty - sixth century. For their own 
good, they should be exiled to eras psychologically congenial to them. A good 
many of them had been sent to California in the year 1849. They thus took a one 
- way trip to an era where murder was not a crime, but a social necessity,
the respectable business of a gentleman. Religious fa­natics were exiled to the 
First Dark Ages, where they could not disturb the tranquil materialism of the 
pres­ent century; too aggressive atheists, to the twenty - third century.
Kenner rose and began to pace his cell, which was a prison in fact, if not in 
appearance. Outside the wide window spread a spacious view of Nyor Harbor, and 
the room was luxuriously furnished. He knew, how­ever, that if he stepped a foot 
past the lines which had been drawn around the door, he would be instantly 
overpowered by a powerful sleeping gas. He had tried it once, with almost 
disastrous results.
This hour of high decision was his last in the twenty - sixth century. In fifty 
minutes, in his own personal, subjective time from now, he would be somewhere in 
the twentieth century, the era to which his rashness had condemned him when he 
had been apprehended by the psycho police while attempting to rediscover the 
fabulous atomic isotopes. And he wouldn't re­member enough to get back. He would 
be permitted to keep all his training - all his knowledge, and me­mory - but 
there would be a fatal reservation.
Never, for the rest of his life, would Kenner be able to remember that he had 
come from the future. For the three weeks during which he had been confined to 
the cell the radiant suggestor had been steadily beaming at his brain. No 
defense his mind could devise had suf­ficed to stay its slow inroads into his 
thought.
Already his brain was beginning to grow fuzzy and he knew that the time was 
short. He drew a long breath, hearing steps in the corridor, and the whistle 
which meant the hypnotic gas was being momentarily turned off.
He stopped pacing.
Abruptly the door opened, and a psycho - supervisor entered the cell. Framed in 
the radiance behind him - 
"Cara!" Kenner almost sobbed, and ran forward to catch his wife in his arms, and 
hold her with hungry violence. She cried softly against him. "Ryn, Ryn, it won't 
be long - "
The supervisor's face was compassionate. "Kenner," he said, "you may have twenty 
minutes alone with your wife. You will be unsupervised." The door closed softly 
behind him.
Kenner led Cara to a seat. She tried to hold back her tears, looking at him with 
wide, frightened eyes. "Ryn, darling, I thought you might have - "
"Hush, Cara," he whispered. "They may be listen­ing. Just remember everything 
I've told you. You mustn't risk being sent to a different year. You already know 
what to do."
"I'll - find you," she promised.
"Let's not talk about it," Kenner urged gently. "We haven't long. Grayne 
promised he'd look after you until - "
"I know. He's been good to me while you were here."
The twenty minutes didn't seem long. The supervi­sor pretended not to notice 
while Cara clung to Kenner in a last agony of farewell. Ryn brushed the tears 
away from her eyes, softly.
"See you in nineteen forty - five, Cara," he whis­pered, and let her go.
"It's a date, darling," were her last words before she followed the supervisor 
out of the prison. Kenner, in the last few moments remaining to him, before he 
sank into sleep again, desperately tried to marshal what little knowledge he 
possessed about the twenti­eth century.
His brain felt dark now, and oppressed, as if some­one had wrapped his mind in 
smothering folds of wool. Dimly he knew that when he woke, his prison would be 
yet unbuilt. And yet, all the rest of his life he would be in prison - the 
prison of a mind that would never let him speak the truth.
 
III
 
" - and of course, this hypothetical psychic block would also contain a 
provision prohibiting marriage with anyone from the past," Carey Kennaird 
finished. "It would naturally be inconvenient for children to be born of the 
time exiles. But if my hypothetical man from the future should actually find the 
wife he'd arranged to have exiled with him, there'd be no psy­chic block against 
marrying her." He paused, staring at me steadily. "Now, what would happen to the 
kid?"
My own glass stood empty. I signaled to the waiter, but Kennaird shook his head. 
"Thanks, I've had enough."
I paid for the wine. "Suppose we walk to the hotel together, Kennaird?" I said. 
"You've got a fascinating theory there, my boy. It would make a fine plot for a 
science - fiction novel. Are you a writer? Of course, what happened to the boy - 
" we passed together into the blinding sunlight of the Chicago Loop, " - would 
be the climax of your story."
"It would," Kennaird agreed.
We crossed the street beneath the thundering El trains, and stood in front of 
Marshall Field's while Carey lit a cigarette.
"Smoke?" he asked.
I shook my head. "No thanks. You said you had a reason for confiding in me, 
young man. What is it?"
He looked at me curiously. "I think you know, Mr. Grayne. You weren't born in 
the Twentieth Century. I was, of course. But you're like Dad and Cara. You're a 
time exile, too, aren't you?"
"I know you can't say anything; because of the psy­chic block. But you don't 
have to deny it. That's now Dad told me. He made me read science - fiction. Then 
he made me ask him leading questions - and just an­swered yes or no." Young 
Kennaird paused. "I don't have the psychic block. Dad was trying to help me
discover the time - travel device. He came up to Chi­cago, and disappeared. But 
I'm on the right track now. I'm sure of it. I think Dad got back somehow."
Even though I'd known what he was going to say, I swallowed hard.
"Something very strange did happen when you were born," I said. "You put a 
peculiar strain on the whole framework of time. It was something that never 
should have happened, because of - " my voice faltered, "the psychic block 
against marrying anyone from the past."
Carey Kennaird looked at me intently. "Hard to talk about the psychic block, 
isn't it? Dad never could."
I nodded without speaking. We climbed the hotel steps together. "Come up to my 
room," I urged. "We'll talk it over. You see, Carey - I'm going to call you that 
- Kenner used to be my friend."
"I wonder," Carey said, "If Dad got home in the twenty - sixth century."
"He did."
Carey stared. "Mr. Grayne! Is he all right?"
Regretfully, I shook my head. The elevator boy let us off on the fourth floor. I 
wondered if he, too, were an exile. I wondered how many people in Chicago were 
exiles, sullen behind the mask of a mental block which clamped a gag on their 
lips when they tried to speak the truth.
I wondered how many men, and how many women, were living such a lie, day in, and 
day out, lonely, miserable exiles from their own tomorrow, victims of a fate 
literally worse than death. Small wonder they would do anything to avoid such a 
fate.
My door closed behind us. While Carey stared, wide - eyed, at the device which 
loomed darkly in one corner of the room, I went to my desk, and removed the 
shining disk. I walked straight up to him. "This is from your father," I told 
him. "Look at it carefully."
He accepted it eagerly, his eyes blazing with excite­ment, sensing at once that 
it had come from the twenty - sixth century.
He died instantly.
Hating my work, hating time - travel, hating the whole chain of events, which 
had made me an instrument of justice, I stepped into the device that would 
return me to the twenty - sixth century.
Carey Kennaird had told the truth. A very strange thing had happened at his 
birth. Like an extra electron bombarding an unstable isotope, he had broken the 
link that held the framework of time together. His birth had started a chain 
reaction that had ended, for me, a week before in 2556, when Kenner and Cara had 
reappeared in the twenty - sixth century and been murdered in a panic by the 
psycho - supervisors. I, al­ready condemned to time exile, had won a free pardon 
for my work, a commutation of my sentence to a light reprimand and the loss of 
my position. It was ugly work and I hated it, for Kenner and Cara had been my 
friends. But I had no freedom of choice. Anything was better than exile into 
time.
Anything, anything.
Besides, it had been necessary.
It isn't lawful for children to be born before their parents.
(7955)
 
 
Death Between the Stars
 
 
They asked me about it, of course, before I boarded the starship. All through 
the Western sector of the Galaxy, few rules are stricter than the one dividing 
human from nonhuman, and the little Captain of the Vesta - he was Terran, too, 
and proud in the black leather of the Empire's merchant - man forces - hemmed 
and hawed about it, as much as was consistent with a spaceman's dignity.
"You see, Miss Vargas," he explained, not once but as often as I would listen to 
him, "this is not, strictly speaking, a passenger ship at all. Our charter is 
only to carry cargo. But, under the terms of our franchise, we are required to 
transport an occasional passenger, from the more isolated planets where there is 
no regu­lar passenger service. Our rules simply don't permit us to discriminate, 
and the Theradin reserved a place on this ship for our last voyage."
He paused, and re - emphasized, "We have only the one passenger cabin, you see. 
We're a cargo ship and we are not allowed to make any discrimination be­tween 
our passengers."
He looked angry about it. Unfortunately, I'd run up against that attitude 
before. Some Terrans won't travel on the same ship with nonhumans even when 
they're isolated in separate ends of the ship.
I understood his predicament, better than he thought. The Theradin seldom travel 
in space. No one could have foreseen that Haalvordhen, the Theradin from 
Samarra, who had lived on the forsaken planet of Deneb for eighteen of its 
cycles, would have chosen this particular flight to go back to its own world.
At the same time, I had no choice. I had to get back to an Empire planet - any 
planet - where I could take a starship for Terra. With war about to explode in 
the Procyon sector, I had to get home before communica­tions were knocked out 
altogether. Otherwise - well, a Galactic war can last up to eight hundred years. 
By the time regular transport service was reestablished, I wouldn't be worrying 
about getting home.
The Vesta could take me well out of the dangerous sector, and all the way to 
Samarra - Sirius Seven - which was, figuratively speaking, just across the 
street from the Solar System and Terra. Still, it was a questionable solution. 
The rules about segregation are strict, the anti - discriminatory laws are 
stricter, and the Theradin had made a prior reservation.
The captain of the Vesta couldn't have refused him transportation, even if fifty 
human, Terran women had been left stranded on Deneb IV. And sharing a cabin with 
the Theradin was ethically, morally and socially out of the question. 
Haalvordhen was a non - human telepath; and no human in his right senses will 
get any closer than necessary even to a human telepath. As for a nonhuman one - 
And yet, what other way was there?
The captain said tentatively, "We might be able to squeeze you into the 
crewmen's quarters - " he paused uneasily, and glanced up at me.
I bit my lip, frowning. That was worse yet. "I under­stand," I said slowly, 
"that this Theradin - Haalvor­dhen - has offered to allow me to share its 
quarters."
"That's right. But, Miss Vargas - "
I made up my mind in a rush. "I'll do it," I said. "It's the best way, all 
around."
At the sight of his scandalized face, I almost regret­ted my decision. It was 
going to cause an interplane­tary scandal, I thought wryly. A human woman - and 
a Terran citizen - spending forty days in space and sharing a cabin with a 
nonhuman!
The Theradin, although male in form, had no single attribute which one could 
remotely refer to as sex. But of course that wasn't the problem. The nonhuman 
were specifically prohibited from mingling with the hu­man races. Terran custom 
and taboo were binding, and I faced, resolutely, the knowledge that by the time 
I got to Terra, the planet might be made too hot to hold me.
Still, I told myself defiantly, it was a big Galaxy. And conditions weren't 
normal just now and that made a big difference. I signed a substantial check for 
my transportation, and made arrangements for the ship­ping and stowing of what 
few possessions I could safely transship across space.
But I still felt uneasy when I went aboard the next day - so uneasy that I tried 
to bolster up my flagging spirits with all sorts of minor comforts. Fortunately 
the Theradin were oxygen - breathers, so I knew there would be no trouble about 
atmosphere - mixtures, or the air pressure to be maintained in the cabin. And 
the Theradin were Type Two nonhumans, which meant that the acceleration of a 
hyperspeed ship would knock my shipmate into complete prostration without 
special drugs. In fact, he would probably stay drugged in his skyhook during 
most of the trip.
The single cabin was far up toward the nose of the starship. It was a queer 
little spherical cubbyhole, a nest. The walls were foam - padded all around the 
sphere, for passengers never develop a spaceman's skill at maneuvering then: 
bodies in free - fall, and cabins had to be designed so that an occupant, moving 
unguardedly, would not dash out his or her brains against an unpadded surface. 
Spaced at random on the inside of the sphere were three skyhooks - nested 
cradles on swinging pivots - into which the passenger was snugged during 
blastoff hi shock - absorbing foam and a compli­cated Garensen pressure - 
apparatus and was thus ena­bled to sleep secure without floating away.
A few screw - down doors were marked LUGGAGE. I immediately unscrewed one door 
and stowed my personal belongings in the bin. Then I screwed the top down 
securely and carefully fastened the padding over it. Finally, I climbed around 
the small cubbyhole, seek­ing to familiarize myself with it before my unusual 
roommate arrived.
It was about fourteen feet in diameter. A sphincter lock opened from the narrow 
corridor to cargo bays and crewmen's quarters, while a second led into the 
cabin's functional equivalent of a bathroom. Planet - bound men and women are 
always surprised and a little shocked when they see the sanitary arrangements on 
a spaceship. But once they've tried to perform normal bodily functions in free - 
fall, they understand the peculiar equipment very well.
I've made six trips across the Galaxy in as many cycles. I'm practically an old 
hand, and can even wash my face in freefall without drowning. The trick is to 
use a sponge and suction. But, by and large, I under­stand perfectly why 
spacemen, between planets, usu­ally look a bit unkempt.
I stretched out on the padding of the main cabin, and waited with growing 
uneasiness for the nonhuman to show. Fortunately, it wasn't long before the 
dia­phragm on the outer sphincter lock expanded, and a curious, peaked face 
peered through.
"Vargas Miss Helten?" said the Theradin in a sibi­lant whisper.
"That's my name," I replied instantly. I pulled up­ward, and added, quite 
unnecessarily, "You are Haalvordhen, of course."
"Such is my identification," confirmed the alien, and the long, lean, oddly - 
muscled body squirmed through after the peaked head. "It is kind, Vargas Miss, 
to share accommodation under this necessity."
"It's kind of you," I said vigorously. "We've all got to get home before this 
war breaks out!"
"That war may be prevented, I have all hope," the nonhuman said. He spoke 
comprehensibly in Galac­tic Standard, but expressionlessly, for the vocal chords 
of the Theradins are located in an auxiliary pair of inner lips, and their 
voices seem reedy and lacking in resonance to human ears.
"Yet know you, Vargas Miss, they would have hurled me from this ship to make 
room for an Empire citizen, had you not been heart - kind to share."
"Good heavens!" I exclaimed, shocked, "I didn't know that!"
I stared at him, disbelieving. The captain couldn't have legally done such a 
thing - or even seriously have entertained the thought. Had he been trying to 
intimi­date the Theradin into giving up his reserved place?
"I - I was meaning to thank you," I said, to cover my confusion.
"Let us thank we - other, then, and be in accord," the reedy voice mouthed.
I looked the nonhuman over, unable to hide com­pletely my curiosity. In form the 
Theradin was vaguely humanoid - but only vaguely - for, the squat arms 
ter­minated in mittened "hands" and the long sharp face was elfin, and 
perpetually grimacing.
The Theradin have no facial muscles to speak of, and no change of expression or 
of vocal inflection is possible to them. Of course, being telepathic, such 
subtleties of visible or auditory expression would be superfluous on the face of 
it.
I felt - as yet - none of the revulsion which the mere presence of the Theradin 
was supposed to inspire. It was not much different from being in the presence of 
a large humanoid animal. There was nothing inherently fearful about the alien. 
Yet he was a telepath - and of a nonhuman breed my species had feared for a 
thou­sand years.
Could he read my mind?
"Yes," said the Theradin from across the cabin. "You must forgive me. I try to 
put up barrier, but it is hard. You broadcast your thought so strong it is 
im­possible to shut it out." The alien paused. "Try not to be embarrass. It 
bother me too."
Before I could think of anything to say to that a crew member in black leather 
thrust his head, unan­nounced, through the sphincter, and said with an air of 
authority, "In skyhooks, please." He moved confi­dently into the cabin. "Miss 
Vargas, can I help you strap down?" he asked.
"Thanks, but I can manage," I told him.
Hastily I clambered into the skyhook, buckling the inner straps, and fastening 
the suction tubes of the complicated Garensen apparatus across my chest and 
stomach. The nonhuman was awkwardly drawing his hands from their protective 
mittens and struggling with the Garensens.
Unhappily the Theradin have a double thumb, and handling the small - size Terran 
equipment is an almost impossibly delicate task. It is made more difficult by 
the fact that the flesh of their "hands" is mostly thin mucous membrane which 
tears easily on contact with leather and raw metal.
"Give Haalvordhen a hand," I urged the crewman. "I've done - this dozens of 
times!"
I might as well have saved my breath. The crewman came and assured himself that 
my straps and tubes and cushions were meticulously tightened. He took what 
seemed to me a long time, and used his hands some­what excessively, I lay under 
the heavy Garensen equip­ment, too inwardly furious to even give him the 
satisfaction of protest.
It was far too long before he finally straightened and moved toward 
Haalvordhen's skyhook. He gave the alien's outer straps only a perfunctory tug 
or two, and then turned his head to grin at me with a totally uncalled - for - 
familiarity.
"Blastoff in ninety seconds," he said, and wriggled himself rapidly out through 
the hook.
Haalvordhen exploded in a flood of Samarran which I could not follow. The 
vehemence of his voice, how­ever, was better than a dictionary. For some strange 
reason I found myself sharing his fury. The unfairness of the whole procedure 
was shameful. The Theradin had paid passage money, and deserved in any case the 
prescribed minimum of decent attention.
I said forthrightly, "Never mind the fool, Haal­vordhen. Are you strapped down 
all right?"
"I don't know," he replied despairingly. "The equip­ment is unfamiliar - "
"Look - " I hesitated, but in common decency I had to make the gesture. "If I 
examine carefully my own Garensens, can you read my mind and see how they should 
be adjusted?"
He mouthed, "I'll try," and immediately I fixed my gaze steadily on the 
apparatus.
After a moment, I felt a curious sensation. It was something like the faint, 
sickening feeling of being touched and pushed about, against my will, by a 
dis­tasteful stranger.
I tried to control the surge of almost physical revul­sion. No wonder that 
humans kept as far as possible from the telepathic races. . .
And then I saw - did I see, I wondered, or was it a direct telepathic 
interference with my perceptions? - a second image superimpose itself on the 
Garensens into which I was strapped. And the realization was so disturbing that 
I forgot the discomfort of the mental rapport completely.
"You aren't nearly fastened in," I warned. "You haven't begun to fasten the 
suction tubes - oh, damn the man. He must have seen in common humanity - " I 
broke off abruptly, and fumbled in grim desperation with my own straps. "I think 
there's just time - "
But there wasn't. With appalling suddenness a vio­lent clamor - the final 
warning - hit my ears. I clenched my teeth and urged frantically: "Hang on! Here 
we go!"
And then the blast hit us! Under the sudden sick­ening pressure I felt my lungs 
collapse, and struggled to remain upright, choking for breath. I heard a queer, 
gagging grunt from the alien, and it was far more disturbing than a human scream 
would have been.
Then the second Shockwave struck with such violence that I screamed aloud in 
completely human terror. Screamed - and blacked out.
I wasn't unconscious very long. I'd never collapsed during takeoff before, and 
my first fuzzy emotion when I felt the touch of familiar things around me again 
was one of embarrassment. What had happened? Then, almost simultaneously, I 
became reassuringly aware that we were in free fall and that the crewman who had 
warned us to alert ourselves was stretched out on the empty air near my skyhook. 
He looked worried.
"Are you all right, Miss Vargas?" he asked, solici­tously. "The blastoff wasn't 
any rougher than usual - "
"I'm all right," I assured him woozily. My shoulders jerked and the Garensens 
shrieked as I pressed up­ward, undoing the apparatus with tremulous fingers. 
"What about the Theradin?" I asked urgently. "His Garensens weren't fastened. 
You barely glanced at them."
The crewman spoke slowly and steadily, with a deliberation I could not mistake. 
"Just a minute, Miss Vargas," he said. "Have you forgotten? I spent every moment 
of the time I was in here fastening the Theradin's belts and pressure 
equipment."
He gave me a hand to assist me up, but I shook it off so fiercely that I flung 
myself against the padding on the opposite side of the cabin. I caught 
apprehen­sively at a handhold, and looked down at the Theradin.
Haalvordhen lay flattened beneath the complex ap­paratus. His peaked pixie face 
was shrunken and ghastly, and his mouth looked badly bruised. I bent closer, 
then jerked upright with a violence that sent me cas­cading back across the 
cabin, almost into the arms of the crewman.
"You must have fixed those belts just now," I said accusingly. "They were not 
fastened before blastoff! It's malicious criminal negligence, and if Haalvordhen 
dies - "
The crewman gave me a slow, contemptuous smile. "It's my word against yours, 
sister," he reminded me.
"In common decency, in common humanity - " I found that my voice was hoarse and 
shaking, and could not go on.
The crewman said humorlessly, "I should think you'd be glad if the geek died in 
blastoff. You're awfully concerned about the geek - and you know how that 
sounds?"
I caught the frame of the skyhook and anchored myself against it. I was almost 
too faint to speak. "What were you trying to do?" I brought out at last. "Murder 
the Theradin?"
The crewman's baleful gaze did not shift from my face. "Suppose you close your 
mouth," he said, with­out malice, but with an even inflection that was far more 
frightening. "If you don't, we may have to close it for you. I don't think much 
of humans who frater­nize with geeks."
I opened and shut my mouth several times before I could force myself to reply. 
All I finally said was, "You know, of course, that I intend to speak to the 
captain?"
"Suit yourself." He turned and strode contemptu­ously toward the door. "We'd 
have been doing you a favor if the geek had died in blastoff. But, as I say, 
suit yourself. I think your geek's alive, anyhow. They're hard to kill."
I clutched the skyhook, unable to move, while he dragged his body through the 
sphincter lock and it contracted behind him.
Well, I thought bleakly, I had known what I would be letting myself in for when 
I'd made the arrange­ment. And since I was already committed, I might as well 
see if Haalvordhen were alive or dead. Resolutely I bent over his skyhook, 
angling sharply to brace my­self in free - fall.
He wasn't dead. While I looked I saw the bruised and bleeding "hands" flutter 
spasmodically. Then, abruptly, the alien made a queer, rasping noise. I felt 
helpless and for some reason I was stirred to compas­sion.
I bent and laid a hesitant hand on the Garensen apparatus which was now neatly 
and expertly fastened. I was bitter about the fact that for the first time hi my 
life I had lost consciousness! Had I not done so the crewman could not have so 
adroitly covered his negli­gence. But it was important to remember that the 
circumstance would not have helped Haalvordhen much either.
"Your feelings do you nothing but credit!" The reedy flat voice was almost a 
whisper. "If I may tres­pass once more on your kindness - can you unfasten these 
instruments again?"
I bent to comply, asking helplessly as I did so, "Are you sure you're all 
right?"
"Very far from all right," the alien mouthed, slowly and without expression.
I had the feeling that he resented being compelled to speak aloud, but I didn't 
think I could stand that telepath touch again. The alien's flat, slitted eyes 
watched me while I carefully unfastened the suction tubes and cushioning 
devices.
At this distance I could see that the eyes had lost their color, and that the 
raw "hands" were flaccid and limp. There were also heavily discolored patches 
about the alien's throat and head. He pronounced, with a terribly thick effort:
"I should have - been drugged. Now it's too late. Argha mad - " the words 
trailed off into blurred Samarran, but the discolored patch in his neck still 
throbbed sharply, and the hands twitched in an agony which, being dumb, seemed 
the more fearful.
I clung to the skyhook, dismayed at the intensity of my own emotion. I thought 
that Haalvordhen had spoken again when the sharp jolt of command sounded, clear 
and imperative, in my brain.
"Procalamine!" For an instant the shock was all I could feel - the shock, and 
the overwhelming revul­sion at the telepathic touch. There was no hesitation or 
apology in it now, for the Theradin was fighting for his life. Again the sharp, 
furious command came: "Give me procalamine!"
And with a start of dismay I realized that most nonhumans needed the drug, which 
was kept on all spaceships to enable them to live in free - fall.
Few nonhuman races have the stubbornly persistent heart of the Terrans, which 
beats by muscular contrac­tion alone. The circulation of the Theradin, and 
sim­ilar races, is dependent on gravity to keep the vital fluid pulsing. 
Procalamine gives their main blood or­gan just enough artificial muscular spasm 
to keep the blood moving and working.
Hastily I propelled myself into the "bathroom"  - wiggled hastily through the 
diaphragm, and un­screwed the top of the bin marked FIRST AID. Neatly 
pigeonholed beneath transparent plastic were sterile bandages, antiseptics 
clearly marked HUMAN and -  separately, for the three main types of nonhuman 
races, in one deep bin - the small plastic globules of vital stimulants.
I sorted out two purple fluorescent ones - little globes marked procalamine - 
and looked at the warning, in raised characters on the globule. It read: FOR 
AD­MINISTRATION BY QUALIFIED SPACE PER­SONNEL ONLY. A touch of panic made my 
dia­phragm catch. Should I call the Vesta's captain, or one of the crew?
Then a cold certainty grew in me. If I did, Haal­vordhen wouldn't get the 
stimulant he needed. I sorted out a fluorescent needle for nonhuman integument, 
pricked the globule and sucked the dose into the nee­dle. Then, with its tip 
still enclosed in the plastic globe, I wriggled myself back to where the alien 
still lay loosely confined by one of the inner straps.
Panic touched me again, with the almost humorous knowledge that I didn't know 
where to inject the stimulant, and that a hypodermic injection in space presents 
problems which only space - trained men are able to cope with. But I reached out 
notwithstanding and gingerly picked up one of the unmittened "hands." I didn't 
stop to think how I knew that this was the proper site for the injection. I was 
too overcome with strong physical loathing.
Instinct from man's remote past on Earth told me to drop the nonhuman flesh and 
cower, gibbering and howling as my simian antecedents would have done. The raw 
membrane was feverishly hot and unpleas­antly slimy to touch. I fought rising 
queasiness as I tried to think how to steady him for the injection.
In free - fall there is no steadiness, no direction. The hypodermic needle, of 
course, worked by suction, but piercing the skin would be the big problem. Also, 
I was myself succumbing to the dizziness of no - gravity flight, and realized 
coldly that if I couldn't make the injection in the next few minutes I wouldn't 
be able to accomplish it at all.
For a minute I didn't care, a primitive part of myself reminding me that if the 
alien died I'd be rid of a detestable cabin mate, and have a decent trip 
be­tween planets.
Then, stubbornly, I threw off the temptation. I stead­ied the needle in my hand, 
trying to conquer the disorientation which convinced me that I was looking both 
up and down at the Theradin.
My own center of gravity seemed to be located in the pit of my stomach, and I 
fought the familiar space voyaging instinct to curl up in the foetal position 
and float. I moved slightly closer to the Theradin. I knew that if I could get 
close enough, our two masses would establish a common center of gravity, and I 
would have at least a temporary orientation while I made the injection.
The maneuver was unpleasant, for the alien seemed unconscious, flaccid and 
still, and mere physical close­ness to the creature was repellent. The feel of 
the thick wettish "hand" pulsing feebly in my own was almost sickeningly 
ultimate. But at last I managed to maneuver myself dose enough to establish a 
common center of gravity between us - an axis on which I seemed to hover briefly 
suspended.
I pulled Haalvordhen's "hand" into this weight - center in the bare inches of 
space between us, braced the needle, and resolutely stabbed with it.
The movement disturbed the brief artificial gravity, and Haalvordhen floated and 
bounced a little weightlessly in his skyhook. The "hand" went sailing back, the 
needle recoiling harmlessly. I swore out loud, now quite foolishly angry, and my 
own jerky movement of annoyance flung me partially across the cabin.
Inching slowly back, I tried to grit my teeth, but only succeeded with a snap 
that jarred my skull. In tense anger, I seized Haalvordhen's "hand," which had 
almost stopped its feverish pulsing, and with a painfully slow effort - any 
quick or sudden movement would have thrown me, in recoil, across the cabin again 
- I wedged Haalvordhen's "hand" under the strap and anchored it there.
It twitched faintly - the Theradin was apparently still sensible to pain - and 
my stomach rose at that sick pulsing. But I hooked my feet under the skyhook's 
frame, and flung my free arm down and across the alien, holding tight to the 
straps that confined him.
Still holding him thus wedged down securely, I jabbed again with the needle. It 
touched, pricked - and then, in despair, I realized it could not penetrate the 
Theradin integument without weight and pressure behind it.
I was too absorbed now in what had to be done to care just how I did it. So I 
wrenched forward with a convulsive movement that threw me, full - length, across 
the alien's body. Although I still had no weight, the momentum of the movement 
drove the hypodermic needle deeply into the flesh of the "hand."
I pressed the catch, then picked myself up slowly, and looked around to see the 
crewman who had jeered at me with his head thrust through the lock again, 
regarding me with the distaste he had displayed to­ward the Theradin, from the 
first. To him I was lower than the Theradin, having degraded myself by close 
contact with a nonhuman.
Under that frigid, contemptuous stare, I was unable to speak. I could only 
silently withdraw the needle and hold it up. The rigid look of condemnation 
altered just a little, but not much. He remained silent, looking at me with 
something halfway between horror and ac­cusation.
It seemed years, centuries, eternities that he clung there, just looking at me, 
his face an elongated ellipse above the tight collar of his black leathers. 
Then, without even speaking, he slowly withdrew his head and the lock contracted 
behind him, leaving me alone with my sickening feeling of contamination and an 
almost hysterical guilt.
I hung the needle up on the air, curled myself into a ball, and, entirely 
unstrung, started sobbing like a fool.
It must have been a long time before I managed to pull myself together, because 
before I even looked to see whether Haalvordhen was still alive, I heard the 
slight buzzing noise which meant it was a meal - period and that food had been 
sent through the chute to our cabin. I pushed the padding listlessly aside, and 
with­drew the heat - sealed containers - one set colorless, the other set 
nonhuman fluorescent.
Tardily conscious of what a fool I'd been making of myself, I hauled my rations 
over to the skyhook, and tucked them into a special slot, so that they wouldn't 
float away. Then, with a glance at the figure stretched out motionless beneath 
the safety - strap of the other skyhook, I shrugged, pushed myself across the 
cabin again, and brought the fluorescent containers to Haalvordhen.
He made a weary, courteous noise which I took for acknowledgment. By now 
heartily sick of the whole business, I set them before him with a bare minimum 
of politeness and withdrew to my own skyhook, occu­pying myself with the always 
- ticklish problem of eating m free - fell.
At last I drew myself up to return the containers to the chute, knowing we 
wouldn't leave the cabin during the entire trip. Space, on a starship, is held 
to a rigid minimum. There is simply no room for untrained out­siders moving 
around in the cramped ship, perhaps getting dangerously close to critically 
delicate equip­ment, and the crew is far too busy to stop and keep an eye on 
rubbernecking tourists.
In an emergency, passengers can summon a crew­man by pressing a call - button. 
Otherwise, as far as the crew was concerned, we were in another world.
I paused in midair to Haalvordhen's skyhook. His containers were untouched and I 
felt moved to say, "Shouldn't you try to eat something?"
The flat voice had become even weaker and more rasping now, and the nonhuman's 
careful enunciation was slurred. Words of his native Samarran intermin­gled with 
queer turns of phrase which I expected were literally rendered from mental 
concepts.
"Heart - kind of you, thakkava Varga Miss, but late. Haalvordhen - I deep in 
grateful wishing - " A long spate of Samarran, thickly blurred followed, then as 
if to himself, "Theradin - we, die nowhere only on Samarra, and only a little 
tune ago Haalvordhen - I knowing must die, and must returning to home planet. 
Saata. Know­ing to return and die there where Theradin - we around dying - " The 
jumble of words blurred again, and the limp "hands" clutched spasmodically, in 
and out.
Then, in a queer, careful tone, the nonhuman said, "But I am not living to 
return where I can stop - die. Not so long Haalvordhen - I be lasting, although 
Vargas - you Miss be helping most like real instead of alien. Sorry your people 
be most you unhelping - " he stopped again, and with a queer little grunting 
noise, contin­ued, "Now Haalvordhen - I be giving Vargas - you stop - gift of 
heritage, be needful it is."
The flaccid form of the nonhuman suddenly stiff­ened, went rigid. The drooping 
lids over the Theradin's eyes seemed to unhood themselves, and in a spasm of 
fright I tried to fling myself backward. But I did not succeed. I remained 
motionless, held in a dumb fascination.
I felt a sudden, icy cold, and the sharp physical nausea crawled over me again 
at the harsh and sicken­ing touch of the alien on my mind, not in words this 
time, but in a rapport even closer - a hateful touch so intimate that I felt my 
body go limp in helpless fits and spasms of convulsive shuddering under the 
deep, hyp­notic contact.
Then a wave of darkness almost palpable surged up in my brain. I tried to 
scream, "Stop it, stop it!" And a panicky terror flitted in my last conscious 
thought through my head. This is why, this is the reason hu­mans and telepathy 
don't mix - 
And then a great dark door opened under my senses and I plunged again into 
unconsciousness.
It was not more than a few seconds, I suppose, before the blackness swayed and 
lifted and I found myself floating, curled helplessly in mid - air, and seeing, 
with a curious detachment, the Theradin's skyhook below me. Something in the 
horrid limpness of that form stirred me wide awake.
With a tight band constricting my breathing, I arrowed downward. I had never 
seen a dead Theradin before, but I needed no one to tell me that I saw one now. 
The constricting band still squeezed my throat in dry gasps, and in a frenzy of 
hysteria I threw myself wildly across the cabin, beating and battering on the 
emer­gency button, shrieking and sobbing and screaming. . .
They kept me drugged all the rest of the trip. Twice I remember waking and 
shrieking out things I did not understand myself, before the stab of needles in 
my arm sent me down into comforting dreams again. Near the end of the flight, 
while my brain was still fuzzy, they made me sign a paper, something to do with 
witnessing that the crew held no responsibility for the Theradin's death.
It didn't matter. There was something clear and cold and shrewd in my mind, 
behind the surface fuzziness, which told me I must do exactly what they wanted, 
or I would find myself in serious trouble with the Terran authorities. At the 
time I didn't even care about that, and supposed it was the drugs. Now, of 
course, I know the truth.
When the ship made planetfall at Samarra, I had to leave the Vesta and transship 
for Terra. The Vesta's little captain shook me by the hand and carefully avoided 
my eyes, without mentioning the dead Thera­din. I had the feeling - strange, how 
clear it was to my perceptions - that he regarded me in the same way he would 
regard a loaded time bomb that might explode at any moment.
I knew he was anxious to hurry me aboard a ship for Terra. He offered me special 
reservations on a lino-cruiser at a nominal price, with the obvious lie that he 
owned a part interest in at. Detachedly I listened to his floundering lies, 
ignored the hand he offered again, and told a lie or two of my own. He was 
angry. I knew he didn't want me to linger on Samarra.
Even so, he was glad to be rid of me.
Descending at last from the eternal formalities of the Terran landing zone, I 
struck out quickly across the port city and hailed a Theradin ground - car. The 
Theradin driving it looked at me curiously, and in a buzzing voice informed me 
that I could find a human conveyance at the opposite corner. Surprised at 
my­self, I stopped to wonder what I was doing. And then - 
And then I identified myself in a way the Theradin could not mistake. He was 
nearly as surprised as I was. I clambered into the car, and he drove me to the 
queer, block - shaped building which my eyes had never seen before, but which I 
now knew as intimately as the blue sky of Terra.
Twice, as I crossed the twisting ramp, I was chal­lenged. Twice, with the same 
shock of internal sur­prise, I answered the challenge correctly.
At last I came before a Theradin whose challenge crossed mine like a sure, sharp 
lance, and the result was startling. The Theradin Haalvamphrenan leaned backward 
twice in acknowledgment, and said - not in words - "Haalvordhen!"
I answered in the same fashion. "Yes. Due to cer­tain blunders, I could not 
return to our home planet, and was forced to use the body of this alien. Having 
made the transfer unwillingly, under necessity, I now see certain advantages. 
Once within this body, it does not seem at all repulsive, and the host is highly 
intelli­gent and sympathetic.
"I regret the feeling that I am distasteful to you, dear friend. But, consider. 
I can now contribute my services as messenger and courier, without 
discrimina­tion by these mind - blind Terrans. The law which pre­vents Theradin 
from dying on any other planet should now be changed."
"Yes, yes," the other acquiesced, quickly grasping my meaning. "But now to 
personal matters, my dear Haalvordhen. Of course your possessions are held 
in­tact for you."
I became aware that I possessed five fine residences upon the planet, a private 
lake, a grove of Theirry-trees, and four chattel boats. Inheritance among the 
Theradin, of course, is dependent upon continuity of the mental personality, 
regardless of the source of the young. When any Theradin died, transferring his 
mind into a new and younger host, the new host at once possessed all of those 
things which had belonged to the former personality. Two Theradin, unsatisfied 
with their individual wealth, sometimes pooled their per­sonalities into a 
single host - body, thus accumulating modest fortunes.
Continuity of memory, of course, was perfect. As Helen Vargas, I had certain 
rights and privileges as a Terran citizen, certain possessions, certain family 
rights, certain Empire privileges. And as Haalvordhen, I was made free of 
Samarra as well.
In a sense of strict justice, I "told" Haalvamphrenan how the original host had 
died. I gave him the cap­tain's name. I didn't envy him, when the Vesta docked 
again at Samarra.
"On second thought," Haalvamphrenan said reflec­tively, "I shall merely commit 
suicide in his presence."
Evidently Helen - Haalvordhen - I had a very long and interesting life ahead of 
me.
So did all the other Theradin.
(1956)
 
Bird of Prey
 
It would be an hour before I could board the starship. Straight ahead, an open 
gateway led to the spaceport, and the white skyscraper which was the 
Headquarters of the Terran Empire on Wolf; behind me, Phi Coronis was dipping 
down over the roofs of the Kharsa - the Old Town - which lay calm in the bloody 
sunset, but alive with the sounds and the smells of human, nonhuman and half - 
human life. The pungent reek of incense from an open street - shrine made my 
nostrils twitch, and a hulked form inside, not human, cast me a surly green 
glance as I turned aside into the cafe at the spaceport gates.
It wasn't crowded inside. A pair of furred chaks lounged beneath the mirrors at 
the far end. One or two spaceport personnel, in storm gear, were drinking coffee 
at the counter, and a trio of Dry-towners, rangy lean men in colorful 
shirtcloaks, stood at a wall - shelf, eating Terran food with aloof dignity. In 
my neat business clothes I felt more conspicuous than the furred and long - 
tailed chaks; an Earthman, a civilian. I or­dered, and by unconscious habit, 
carried my food to a wall - shelf near the Dry-towners, the only native hu­mans 
on Wolf.
They were tall as Earthmen, weathered by the fierce sun of their parched cities 
of dusty salt stone - the Dry Towns which lie in the bleached bottoms of Wolfs 
vanished oceans. Their dialect fell soft and familiar on my ears. One, without 
altering his expression or his easy tone, had begun to make elaborate comments 
on my entrance, my appearance, my ancestry and proba­ble personal habits, all 
defined in the colorfully ob­scene dialect of the Dry Towns.
I leaned over and remarked, in the man's own dia­lect, that at some future and 
unspecified time I would appreciate an opportunity to return their compliments.
By custom they should have apologized, and laughed at a jest decently reversed 
on themselves. Then we would have bought each other a drink, and that would have 
been that. But it didn't happen that way. Not this time.
Instead, to my dismay, one of them fumbled inside the clasp of his shirt cloak; 
I edged backward, and found my own hand racing upward, seeking a skean I hadn't 
carried his six years. It looked like a rough-house.
The chaks in the corner moaned and chattered. Then I became aware that the three 
Dry-towners were gazing, not at me, but at something, or someone, just Behind 
me. Their skeans fumbled back into the clasps of then' cloaks, and they surged 
back a pace or two.
Then they broke ranks, turned and ran. They ran -  blundering into stools as 
they went, leaving a havoc of upset benches and broken crockery in their wake. I 
let my breath go, turned, and saw the girl.
She was slight, with waving hair like spun black glass, circled with a tracery 
of stars. A black glass belt imprisoned her waist, like clasped hands, and her 
robe, stark white, bore an ugly sprawl of embroidery across the breasts - the 
hideous Toad-god, Nebran. Her face was all human, all woman, but the crimson 
eyes held a hint of alien mischief.
Then she stepped backward, and with one swift movement she was outside in the 
dark street. A smudge of incense from the street - shrine blurred the air; there 
was a little stirring, like the rising of heat waves in the salt desert at noon. 
Then the shrine of Nebran was empty, and nowhere hi the street was there a sign 
of the girl; she simply was not there.
I turned toward the spaceport, slowly, walking through a dragging reluctance, 
trying to file the away in memory as just another riddle of Wolf that I'd never 
solve.
I'd never solve another riddle on Wolf. I'd never see it again. When the 
starship lifted at dawn, I'd be on it, outbound from Phi Coronis - the red sun 
of Wolf.
I strode toward the Terran H.Q.
No matter what the color of the sun, once you step inside an H.Q. building, you 
are on Terra. The Traffic Division was efficiency made insolent, in glass and 
chrome and polished steel. I squinted, readjusting my eyes to the cold 
yellowness of the light, and watched myself stride forward in a dozen mirrors; a 
tall man with a scarred face, bleached by years spent under a red sun. Even 
after six years, my neat civilian clothes didn't fit quite right, and, with 
unconscious habit, I still walked with the lean stoop of the Dry-towners I had 
impersonated. The clerk, a rabbity little man, raised his head in civil inquiry.
"My name's Cargill," I told him. "Have you a pass for me?"
He stared. A free pass aboard a starship is rare except for professional 
spacemen, which I obviously wasn't. "Let me check my records," he hedged, and 
punched scanning buttons on the mirror top of the desk. "Brill, Cameron - ah, 
yes, Cargill - are you Race Cargill of the Secret Service, sir? The Race 
Cargill? Why, I thought - I mean - everybody took it for granted that you were - 
"
"You thought I'd been killed a long time ago be­cause my name never turned up in 
the news? Yes, I'm Race Cargill. I've been working upstairs on Floor 38 for six 
years, holding down a desk any clerk could handle."
He gawped. "You, the man who went to Charm in disguise and routed out The Liess? 
And you've been working upstairs all these years? It's - hard to believe, sir!"
My mouth twitched. It had been hard for me to believe while I was doing it. "The 
pass?"
"Right away, sir." There was respect in his voice now, despite those six years. 
Six years of slow death since Rakhal Sensar had left me a marked man, my scarred 
face making me a target for all my old ene­mies, and ruining my career as a 
Secret Service man.
Rakhal Sensar - my fists knotted with the old, impo­tent hate. And yet, it had 
been Rakhal Sensar who had first led me into the secret byways of Wolf, 
teach­ing me a dozen alien languages, coaching me in the walk and step of a 
Dry-towner, perfecting a disguise which had become deep second nature to me. 
Rakhal was a Dry-towner from Shainsa, and he had worked in the Terran Secret 
Service, my partner since we were boys. Even now I was not sure why he had 
erupted, one day, into the violence that ended our friendship. Then he had 
simply disappeared, leaving me a marked man, my usefulness to the Secret Service 
ended ... a bitter man tied to a desk . . . and a lonely man - Juli had gone 
with him.
With a small whirring noise, a chip of plastic emerged from a slot on the desk. 
I pocketed the pass, and thanked the clerk.
I went down the skyscraper step, and across the vast expanse of the spaceport, 
avoiding or ignoring the last - minute bustle of cargo loading, process crews, 
cu­rious spectators. The starship loomed over me, huge and hateful.
A steward took me to a cabin, then strapped me into the bunk, tugging at the 
acceleration belts until my whole body ached. A long needle went into my arm - 
the narcotic that would keep me safely drowsy during takeoff. Doors clanged, men 
moved and talked in the corridors with a vague excitement. All I knew about 
Theta Centaurus, my destination, was that it had a red sun, and the Legate on 
Megaera could use a trained Secret Service man. And not pin him down at a desk. 
My mind wandered and it was a pair of crim­son eyes, and hair like spun black 
glass, that tumbled down with me, down to the bottomless pit of sleep. \ .
. . . someone was shaking me.
"Ah, come on, Cargill. Wake up, fella."
My eyes throbbed, and when I got them open I saw two men in the black leather of 
spaceforce guards, mingled with some vague memory of a dream. We were still 
inside gravity. I came all the way awake with a rush, swinging my legs out of 
the bunk, flinging aside the belts somebody had unfastened.
"What the devil - 4s something wrong with my pass?"
He shook his head. "Magnusson's orders. Ask him about it. Can you walk?"
I could, although my feet were a little shaky on the ladders.
I knew it made no sense to ask what was going on. They wouldn't know. I asked 
anyway. "Are they hold­ing the ship for me?"
"Not that one," he answered.
My head was clearing fast, and the walk speeded up the process. As the elevator 
swooped up to Floor 38, my anger mounted. Magnusson had been sympathetic when I 
resigned; he'd arranged the transfer and the pass himself. What right did he 
have to grab me off an outbound starship at the last minute? I barged into his 
office without knocking.
"What's this all about, chief?"
Magnusson was at his desk, a big bull of a man who always looked as if he'd 
slept in his rumpled uniform. He said, not looking up, "Sorry, Cargill, but 
there was just time to get you off the ship - no time to explain."
There was somebody hi the chair in front of his desk; a woman, sitting very 
straight, her back to me. But when she heard my voice, she twisted around, and I 
stared, rubbing my eyes. Then she cried out, "Race, Race! Don't you know me?"
I took one dazed step forward. Then she had flown across the space between us, 
her thin arms tangling around my neck, and I caught her up.
"Juli!"
"Oh, Race, I thought I'd die when Mac told me you were leaving tonight, it was 
the only thing that kept me going, the thought of seeing you," she sobbed and 
laughed at once. I held my sister at arm's length, looking down at her. I saw 
the six years that divided us, all of them, printed plain on her face. Juli had 
been a pretty child; six years had fined her features into beauty, but there was 
tension in the set of her shoulders, and the gray eyes had looked into horrors.
I said, "What's wrong, Juli? Where's Rakhal?"
I felt her shiver, a deep thing that I could feel right up through my own arms.
"I don't know. He's gone. And - oh, Race, he's taken Rindy with him!"
"Who's Rindy?"
She didn't move.
"My daughter, Race. Our little girl."
Magnusson's voice sounded low and harsh. "Well, Cargill? Should I have let you 
go?"
"Don't be a damned fool!"
"Juli, tell Race what you told me - just so he'll know you didn't come for 
yourself."
I knew that, already. Juli was proud, and she had always been able to live with 
her own mistakes. This wouldn't be any simple complaint of an abused wife.
She said, "You made your big mistake, Mac, when you turned Rakhal out of the 
Service. He was one of the best men you had."
"Matter of policy. I never knew how his mind worked. Do you, Juli? Even now? 
That final episode -  Juli, have you taken a good look at your brother's face?"
Juli raised her eyes, and I saw her wince. I knew just how she felt; for almost 
three years I'd kept my mirror covered. Then she said, almost inaudibly, 
"Rakhafs face is - is just as bad."
"That's some satisfaction," I said.
Mac looked baffled. "Even now I don't know what it was all about."
"And you never will," I said for the dozenth time. "Nobody could understand it, 
unless he'd lived in the Dry Towns. Let's not talk about that. You talk, Juli. 
What brought you here? And what about the kid?"
"At first Rakhal worked as a trader in Shainsa," Juli began. I wasn't surprised. 
The Dry Towns were the core of Terran trade on Wolf. "Rakhal didn't like what 
the Empire was doing. But he tried to keep out of it. There were times - they'd 
come to him and ask for information, information he could have given them, but 
he never told anything - "
Mac grunted, "Yeah, he's an angel. Go ahead."
Juli didn't, not immediately; instead, she asked, "Is it true what he told me - 
that the Empire has a stand­ing offer of a reward for a working model of a 
matter - transmitter?"
"That offer's been standing for five hundred years, Terran reckoning. Don't tell 
me he was going to in­vent one!"
"I don't think so, no. But he heard rumors - he knew about one. He said he was 
going to try to find it - for money and Shainsa. He started coming in at odd 
times - wouldn't talk to me about it. He was queer about Rindy. Funny thing. 
Crazy. He'd brought her some kind of nonhuman toy from one of the inland towns, 
Charm, I think. It was a weird thing, scared me. He'd talk to her about it and 
Rindy would gabble all kinds of nonsense about little men and birds and a 
toymaker - it changed him, it …"
Juli swallowed hard, twisting her thin fingers in her lap. "A weird thing - I 
was afraid of it, and we had a terrible fight. He threw it out and Rindy woke up 
and shrieked, she screamed for hours and hours. Then she dug it up out of a 
trash pile, she broke all her finger­nails but she kept on digging for it, we 
never knew where or why, and Rakhal was like a crazy man - " abruptly Juli 
checked herself, and visibly caught at vanishing self - control.
Magnusson broke in, very gently. "Juli, tell Race about the riots in Charin."
"In Charin - oh. I think he led the rioting; he came back with a knife cut hi 
his thigh. I asked him if he was mixed up in the anti - Terran movements, and 
when he wouldn't answer - that was when I threatened to leave him, and he said 
if I came there - I'd never see Rindy again. The next day he was gone - "
Suddenly the hysteria Juli had been forcing back broke free and she rocked back 
and forth in her chair, torn and shaken with great strangling sobs. "He - took - 
 Rindy! Oh, Race, he's crazy, crazy, I think he hates Rindy, he took - he 
smashed her toys, Race, he took every toy she had and broke them one by one, 
smashed them into powder, every toy she had - "
"Juli. Juli, please - " Magnusson pleaded. I looked at him, shaken. "If we're 
dealing with a maniac - "
"Mac, let me handle this. Juli. Shall / find Rakhal for you?"
A hope was born in her ravaged face, and died there, while I looked. "He'd have 
you killed. Or kill you."
"He'd try, you mean," I amended. I stooped and lifted Juli, not gently, my hands 
gripping at her shoul­ders in a sort of rage.
"And I won't kill him - do you hear? He may wish I had, when I get through with 
him - hear me, Mi? I'll beat the living daylights out of him, but I'll settle it 
with him like an Earthman."
Magnusson stepped toward me and pried my crush­ing hands off her shoulders. He 
said, "Okay, Cargill. So we're all crazy. I'll be crazy too - try it your way."
A month later, I found myself near the end of a long trail.
I hadn't seen an Earthman or a Dry - towner in five days. Charm was mostly a 
chak town; not many hu­mans lived there, and it was the core and center of the 
resistance movement. I'd found that out before I'd been there an hour.
I crouched along the shadow of a wall, looking toward the gypsy glare of fires, 
hot and reeking at the far end of the Street of the Six Shepherds. My skin 
itched from the dirty shirt cloak I hadn't changed in days - shabbiness is wise 
hi nonhuman parts, and Dry-towners from the salt lands think too highly of water 
to spend much of it in washing, anyway.
It had been a long and difficult trail. But I'd been lucky. And if my luck held, 
Rakhal would be some­where in the crowd around those fires.
A dirty, dust - laden wind was blowing up along the street, heavy with the reek 
of incense from a street - shrine. I took a few steps toward the firelight, then 
stopped, hearing running feet.
Somewhere, a girl screamed.
Seconds later, I saw her; a child, thin and barefoot, a tangle of dark hair 
flying loose as she darted and twisted to elude the lumbering fellow at her 
heels. His outstretched paw jerked cruelly at one slim wrist. The girl sobbed 
and wrenched herself free and threw herself straight on me, wrapping herself 
around my neck with the violence of a storm wind. Her hair got in my mouth, and 
her small hands gripped at my back like a cat's flexed claws. "Oh, help me," she 
sobbed, "don't let him, don't - " And even in that broken cry, I took it in; the 
brat did not speak the jargon of the slum, but the pure, archaic Shainsa 
dialect.
What I did then was just as automatic as if it had been Juli; I pulled the kid's 
fists loose, shoved her behind me, and scowled at the pig - eyed fellow who 
lurched toward us. "Make yourself scarce," I advised.
The man reeled; I smelled sour wine and the rank - ness of his rags as he thrust 
one grimy paw at the girl. I thrust myself between them and put my hand on the 
skean quickly.
"Earthman!" The man spit out the word like filth.
"Earthman!" Someone took up the howl; there was a stir, a rustle, all along the 
street that had seemed empty, and from nowhere, it seemed, the space in front of 
me was crowded with shadowy forms, human and - otherwise.
"Grab him, Spilkar! Run him outa' Charin!"
"Earthman!"
I felt the muscles across my belly knotting into a hard band of ice. I didn't 
believe I'd given myself away as an Earthman - the bully was using the old
Wolf tactic of stirring up a riot in a hurry - but just the same I looked 
quickly round, hunting a path of escape. "Put your skean in his guts, Spilkar!" 
"Hai - ai! Earth man! Hai - ai!" It was that last sound that made me panic, the 
shrill yelping Hai - ai of the Ya - men. Through the sultry glare of the fires, 
I could see the plumed and taloned fig­ures, leaping and rustling; the crowd 
melted open. "Hai - ai! Hai - ai!"
I whirled, snatching the girl up, and high - tailed it back the way I'd come, 
only faster. I heard the yelping shrieks of the Ya - men behind me, and the 
rustle of their stiff plumes; I dived headlong around the corner, ducked into an 
alley, and set the girl on her feet. "Run, kid!"
"No, no! This way!" she urged in a hasty whisper, and her small fingers closed 
like a steel trap around my wrist; she jerked hard, and I found myself plung­ing 
forward into the shelter of a street - shrine.
"Here - " she panted, "stand in - close to me, on the stone - " I drew back, 
startled.
"Oh, don't stop to argue," she whimpered. "Come here! Quick!"
"Hai - ai! Earthman! There he is - " The girl's arms flung round me again; I 
felt her slight, hard body pressing on mine, and she literally hauled me toward 
the center of the shrine.
The world tilted. The street disappeared in a cone of spinning lights, stars 
plummeted crazily, and I plunged down - locked in the girl's arms - spun - 
dropped head - over - heels through reeling lights and shadows that wheeled 
around us. The yelping of the Ya - men whis­pered away in unimaginable 
distances, and for a sec­ond I felt the swift unmerciful blackout of a 
powerdive, with blood breaking from my nostrils and filling my mouth. . . .
Light flared in my eyes. I was standing square on my feet in a little street - 
shrine - but the street was gone. Coils of incense still smudged the air, the 
God squatted, toadlike, in his recess; the girl was still hanging limp, locked 
between my clenched arms. As the floor straightened under my feet, I staggered 
forward, thrown off balance by the sudden return of the girl's weight, and 
grabbed, blindly, for support.
"Give her to me," said a voice at my ear, and the girl's light sagging body was 
lifted from my arms. A strong hand grasped my elbow; I found a chair be­neath my 
knees, and sank gratefully into it.
"The transmission isn't smooth between such distant terminals," the voice 
remarked, "I see that Miellyn has fainted again. A weakling, the girl, but 
useful."
I spat blood, trying to get the room in focus. For I was inside a room; 
windowless, but with a transparent skylight, through which pink daylight 
streamed m thin long splinters. Daylight - and it had been midnight hi Charin! 
I'd come halfway around the planet in a few seconds!
From somewhere, the room was filled with a sound of hammering; tiny, bell - like 
hammering, a fairy's an­vil. I looked up and saw a man - a man? - watching me.
On Wolf you see all kinds of human, nonhuman and half - human Me. I consider 
myself an expert on all three. But I had never seen anyone who so closely 
resembled the ordinary human - and so obviously wasn't. He, or it, was tall and 
lean, humanoid, but oddly muscled, a vague suggestion of something less than 
human in the lean hunch of his body. Manlike, he wore tight - fitting trunks, 
and a shirt of green fur that revealed bulging biceps where they shouldn't be, 
and angular planes where there should have been swell­ing muscles. The shoulders 
were high and hunched, the neck unpleasantly sinuous, and the face, only a 
little narrower than human, was handsomely arrogant, with a kind of wary, alert 
mischief that was the least human thing about him.
He bent, tilted the girl's inert body on to a divan of some sort, and turned his 
back on her, lifting his hand in an impatient gesture.
All the little tinkling hammers stopped as if their switch had been turned out.
"Now," said the nonhuman, "we can talk."
Like the waif, he spoke the archaic Shainsa, with its lilting, sing - song rise 
and fall. I asked in the same language, "What happened? Who are you? And where 
am I?"
The nonhuman crossed his hands. "Do not blame Miellyn. She acted under orders. 
It was imperative to bring you here, and we had reason to believe you might 
ignore an ordinary summons. You were clever at evading our surveillance - for a 
while. But there would not have been two Dry-towners in Charin to­night. You are 
Rakhal Sensar?"
Rakhal Sensar!
Shaken, I pulled a rag from my pocket and wiped the blood from my mouth. As far 
as I knew, there was no resemblance between Rakhal and myself - but it occurred 
to me, for the first time, that any casual description would fit either of us. 
Humans, tall and lean and without distinctive coloring, with the Dry-towner's 
walk and speech, and the same scars across face and mouth - and I'd been hanging 
around in Rakhal's old haunts. The mistake was natural; and natural or not, I 
wasn't going to deny it.
"We knew," the nonhuman continued, that if you remained where you were, the 
Earthman who has been trailing you - Cargill - would have made his ar­rest. We 
knew about your quarrel with Cargill - among other things - but we did not 
consider it necessary that you should fall into his hands."
I was puzzled "I still don't understand. Exactly where am I?"
"This is the Master - shrine of Nebran." Nebran! Knowing what Rakhal would have 
done, I hastily made the quick good - luck gesture, gabbling a few archaic 
words.
Like every Earthman on Wolf, I'd seen blanked impassive faces at mention of the 
Toad - god. Rumor made his spies omniscient, his priesthood virtually 
omnipotent, his powers formidable. I had believed about a tenth of what I heard, 
but even that was consider­able. Now I was in his shrine, and the device which 
had brought me here, without a doubt, was a working model of a matter - 
transmitter.
A matter - transmitter - a working model - Rakhal was after it.
"And who," I asked slowly, "are you, Lord?"
The green - clad creature hunched his shoulders in a ceremonious bow. "My name 
is Evarin. Humble ser­vant of Nebran and yourself, honorable sir," he added, but 
there was no humility hi his manner. "I am called the Toymaker."
Evarin. That was another name given weight by rumor; a breath of gossip in a 
thieves market, a scrawled name on a torn scrap of paper - a blank folder in 
Terran Intelligence. A Toymaker . . .
The girl on the divan sat up, passing slim hands over her disheveled hair. "My 
poor feet," she mourned, "they are black and blue with the cobbles, and my hair 
is filled with sand and tangles! Toymaker, I will do no more of your errands! 
What way was this to send me to entice a man?"
She stamped one small bare foot, and I saw that she was not nearly as young as 
she had looked in the street; although immature by Terran standards, she had a 
fair figure for a Dry - town girl. Her rags fell around her slim legs in 
graceful folds, her hair was spun black glass, and I suddenly saw what the 
confu­sion in the filthy street had kept me from seeing before.
It was the girl of the spaceport cafe - the girl with the Toad - god embroidered 
on the breast of her robes, who had sent the Dry-towners to running madly, 
in­sane with terror.
I saw that Evarin was watching me, and turned idly away. Evarin said, with a 
kind of rueful impatience, "You know you enjoyed yourself, Miellyn. Run along 
and make yourself beautiful again."
She danced out of the room.
The Toymaker motioned to me. "This way," he directed, and led me through a 
different door. The offstage hammering I had heard, tiny bell - tones like a 
fairy xylophone, began again as the door opened, and we passed into a workroom 
which made me remember nursery tales from a half - forgotten childhood on Terra. 
For the workers were tiny, gnarled - trolls! They were chaks - chaks from the 
Polar mountains, furred and half - human, with witchlike faces, but transformed, 
dwarfed. Tiny hammers pattered on miniature anvils, in a tinkling, jingling 
chorus of musical clinks and taps. Beady eyes focused, like lenses, over winking 
jewels and gimcracks. Busy elves. Makers of - 
Toys!
Evarin jerked his hunched shoulders with an imper­ative gesture; I recalled 
myself, following him through the fairy workroom, casting lingering glances at 
the worktables. A withered leprechaun set eyes into the head of a minikin hound; 
delicate fingers worked pre­cious metals into invisible filigree for the 
collarpiece of a dainty dancing doll with living emerald eyes; metallic feathers 
were thrust in clockwork precision into the wings of a skeleton bird no larger 
than a fingernail. The nose of the hound wobbled sensitively, the bird's wings 
quivered, the eyes of the little dancer swiveled to follow me as I passed.
Toys?
"Come along." Evarin rapped, and a door slid shut behind us. The clinks and taps 
grew faint, fainter. But never ceased.
"Now you know, Rakhal, why I am called Toymaker. Is it not strange - the Master 
priest of Nebran a maker of Toys, the shrine of the Toad - god a workshop for 
children's playthings?" Evarin didn't wait for an an­swer. From a sliding 
cabinet, he took out a doll.
She was, perhaps, the length of my longest finger, molded to the precise 
proportions of woman, and cos­tumed in the bizarre fashion of the Shainsa 
dancers. Evarin touched no button or key visible to me, but when he set the 
figurine on its feet, it executed a whirling, arm - tossing dance, in a familiar 
and tricky tempo.
"I am, perhaps, in a sense, benevolent," Evarin murmured. He snapped his fingers 
and the doll sank to her knees and posed there, silent. "Moreover, I have the 
means and - let us say - the ability to indulge my small fancies. The small 
daughter of the President of the Federation of Trade Cities was sent such a doll 
recently. What a pity that Paolo Arimengo was so suddenly impeached and 
banished!" The Toymaker clucked his teeth commiseratingly, "Perhaps a little 
companion - such as this - may comfort little Carmela for her adjustment to her 
new - position."
He replaced the dancer and pulled down something like a whirligig. "This might 
interest you," he mused, and set it spinning. I stared, entranced, at the 
wheel­ing pattern of lights and shadows that flowed and disappeared, melting in 
and out of visible patterns . . . Suddenly I realized what the thing was doing. 
I wrested my eyes away with an effort. Had I blanked out?
Evarin arrested the compelling motion with one fin­ger. "Several of these 
harmless toys are available to the children of important men," he said absently, 
"an export of value for our impoverished and exploited world. Unfortunately, an 
incidence of nervous break­downs is - ah - interfering somewhat with their sale. 
The children, of course, are unaffected, and - ah - love them." Evarin set the 
hypnotic wheel moving again for an instant, glanced sidewise at me, and set it 
care­fully back.
"Now - " Evarin's voice, hard with the silkiness of a tiger - snarl, clawed 
across sudden silence. "We'll talk business!"
He had something concealed in one hand. "You are probably wondering how we 
recognized and found you?" A panel cleared in die wall, and became trans­lucent; 
confused flickers moved on the surface, then dropped into focus and I realized 
that the panel was an ordinary television screen and that I was looking down 
into the well - known interior of the Cafe of Three Rainbows, in the small 
Terran Colony at Charin. The focus gradually sharpened down on the long, Earth - 
type bar, where a tall man in spaceman's leathers was talking with a pale - 
haired Terran girl.
Evan said at my ear, "By now, Race Cargill has decided that you fell into his 
trap and the hands of the Ya - men."
It seemed so unbearably funny that my shoulders twitched. Since I landed in 
Charin, I'd gone to great pains to avoid the Terran colony. And Rakhal, 
some­how, discovering this, had conveniently filled my empty place. By posing as 
me.
Evarin rasped, "Cargill meant to leave the planet -  and something stopped him. 
What? You could be of great use to us, Rakhal - but not with this blood - feud 
unsettled!"
That needed no elucidation. No Wolfan in his senses will make any bargain with a 
Dry-towner carrying an unresolved blood-feud. By law and custom, formal blood - 
feud takes precedence over any other business, public or private, and is 
sufficient and legal excuse for broken promises, neglected duties - even theft 
or murder.
"We want this feud settled, once and for all," Evarin's voice was low, and 
unhurried, "and we're not above weighting the scales. This man Cargill can, and 
has, posed as a Dry - towner. We don't like Earthmen who can spy on us that way. 
In settling your blood - feud, you would do us a service, and we would be 
grateful. Look."
He opened his closed hand, displaying something small, curled, inert.
"Every living being emits a characteristic pattern of electrical nerve impulses. 
As you may have guessed, we have methods of recording these individual 
pat­terns, and we have had you and Cargill under observa­tion for a long time. 
We've had plenty of opportunity to key this - Toy - to Cargill's personal 
pattern." On his palm the curled, inert thing stirred and spread wings; a 
fledgling bird lay there, small soft body throbbing slightly; half - hidden in a 
ruff of metallic feathers, I glimpsed a grimly elongated beak. The tiny pinions 
were feathered with delicate down less than a quarter of an inch long; they 
beat, with rough insis­tence, against the Toymaker's prisoning fingers.
"This is not dangerous - to you. Press this point" - he showed me - "and if Race 
Cargill is within a certain distance - it is up to you to be within that 
distance - it will find Cargill and kill him. Unerringly, inescapably and 
untraceably. We will not tell you the critical dis­tance. And we give you three 
days."
He checked my startled exclamation with a gesture. "It is only fair to tell you; 
this is a test. Within the hour, Cargill will receive a warning. We want no 
in­competents who must be helped too much. Nor do we want cowards! If you fail, 
or try to evade the test - " there was green and inhuman malice in his eyes - 
"we have made another bird."
He was silent, but I thought I understood the com­plexity of Wolf illogic. "The 
other bird is keyed to me?"
With slow contempt, Evarin shook his head.
"You? You are used to danger and fond of a gam­ble. Nothing so simple! We have 
given you three days. If, within that time, the bird you carry has not killed, 
the other bird will fly, and it will kill. Rakhal Sensar -  you have a wife. . 
."
Yes, Rakhal had a wife. They could threaten his wife. . . . And his wife was my 
sister Juli. . .
Everything after that was anticlimax. Of course I had to drink wine with Evarin, 
the elaborately formal ritual without which no business agreement on Wolf is 
valid, and go through equally elaborate courtesies and formalities. Evarin 
entertained me with gory and tech­nical descriptions of the methods by which the 
birds -  and others of his hellish Toys - did their killing and their other 
tasks. Miellyn danced into the room and upset our sobriety by perching on my 
knee and drink­ing sips from my cup, and pouting prettily when I paid her less 
attention than she thought she merited. She even whispered something about a 
rendezvous in the Cafe of the Three Rainbows.
But eventually it was over, and I stepped through a door that twisted, and I 
spun again through a queer giddy blackness, and found myself outside a blank, 
windowless wall, back in Charin. I found my way to my lodging in a filthy chak 
hostel, and threw myself down on the verminous bed.
Believe it or not, I slept.
Later I went out into the reddening morning. I pulled Evarin's toy from my 
pocket, unwrapped the silk slightly, and tried to make some sense from my 
predicament.
The little thing lay innocent and silent in my palm. It couldn't tell me whether 
it had been keyed to me, the real Cargill, or to Rakhal, using my name and 
reputation in the Terran Colony. If I pressed the stud, it might hunt down 
Rakhal, and all my troubles would be over. On the other hand, if it killed me, 
presumably the other bird, keyed to Juli, would never fly - which would save her 
life, but would not get Rindy back for her. And if I delayed past Evarin's 
deadline, one of the birds would hunt down Juli, and give her a swift and not 
too painless death.
I spent the day lounging in a chak dive, juggling a dozen plans frantically in 
my head. Toys, innocent and sinister. Spies, messengers. Toys which killed - and 
horribly. Toys which could be controlled by the pliant mind of a child - and 
every child hates his parents now and again!
I kept coming back to the same conclusion. Juli was in danger, but she was half 
a world away, while Rakhal was here in Charin, calmly masquerading as me. There 
was a child involved, Juli's child, and I had made a promise involving that 
child; the first step was to get inside Charin's Terran Colony, and see how the 
land lay.
Charin is a city shaped like a crescent moon, encircling the small Colony of the 
Trade City; a miniature spaceport, a miniature skyscraper of an HQ, the 
clus­tered dwellings of the Terrans who worked there and those who lived with 
them and catered to their needs.
Entry from one to another - since Charin is in hos­tile territory, and far 
beyond the impress of the ordi­nary Terran law - is through a guarded gateway; 
but the gate stood wide open, and the guards looked lazy and bored. They carried 
shockers, but they didn't look as if they'd ever used them. One raised an 
eyebrow at his companion as I shambled to the gate and requested permission to 
enter the Terran Zone.
They inquired my name and business. I gave a Dry - towner name I'd used when I 
was known from Shainsa to the Polar Mountains, and tacked one of the Secret 
Service passwords to the end of it. They looked at each other again, and one 
said, "Yeah, this is the guy," and they took me into the booth beside the gate 
and one of them used an intercom device. Presently they took me along into the 
HQ building, and into an office that said LEGATE.
Evidently I had walked straight into another trap. One of the guards asked me, 
straight out, "All right, now. Just what, exactly, is your business in the 
Terran Colony?"
"Terran business. You'll have to make a visicall to check on me. Put me straight 
through to Magnusson's office at Central HQ. The name's Race Cargill."
The guard made no move. He was grinning. He said to his partner. "Yeah, that's 
the guy, all right, the one we were told to watch out for." He put a hand on my 
shoulder and spun me around.
There were two of them, and spaceforce guards aren't picked for their good 
looks. Just the same, I gave a good account of myself, until the inner door 
burst open and a man stormed out.
"What's all this racket?"
One of the guards got a hammerlock on me, giving my arm a twist. "This Dry - 
towner bum tried to talk us into making a priority call to Magnusson - the 
Secret Service Chief, that is. He knew one or two of the Secret Service 
passwords - that's how he got through the gate. Remember, Cargill passed the 
word that someone might turn up trying to impersonate him?"
"I remember." The strange man's eyes were wary and cold.
I found myself seized by the guards, and frog - marched to the gate; one of the 
men pushed my skean back into its clasp, the other pushed me, hard, and I 
stumbled, and fell sprawling on the chinked street.
First round to Rakhal. He had sprung the trap on me, very neatly.
The street was narrow and crooked, winding along between double rows of untidy 
pebble - houses. I walked for hours.
It was dusk when I realized that I was being followed.
At first it was a glance out of the corner of my eye, a head seen a little too 
frequently behind me for coincidence. It developed into a too - persistent 
foot­step in an uneven rhythm; tap-tap-tap, tap- tap-tap.
I had my skean handy, but I had a hunch this wasn't anything I could settle with 
a skean. I ducked into a side street, and waited for my follower.
Nothing.
After a time, I went on, laughing at my imagined fears.
Then, after a time, the soft and persistent footfall thudded behind me again.
I fled down a strange street, where women sat on flower - decked balconies, 
their open lanterns flowing with fountains and rivulets of gold and orange fire; 
I raced down quiet streets where furred children crept to doors and watched me 
pass, with great golden eyes that shone in the dusk.
I dodged into an alley and lay there. Someone not two inches away said softly, 
"Are you one of us, brother?"
I muttered something surly in his dialect, and a hand seized my elbow. "This 
way, then."
Taptaptap. Taptaptap.
I let my arm relax in the hand that guided me. Wherever I was being taken, it 
might shake off my follower. I flung a fold of my shirtcloak over my face, and 
went along.
I stumbled over steps, then took a jolting stride downward and found myself in a 
dim room, jammed with dark figures, human and nonhuman. The figures swayed in 
the dimness, chanting in a dialect not al­together familiar to me; a monotonous 
wailing chant, with a single recurrent phrase: "Kamaina! Kamaina!" beginning on 
a high note, descending in a series of weird chromatics to the lowest tone the 
human ear could resolve. The sound made me draw back; even Dry-towners shunned 
the orgiastic rituals of Kamaina.
My eyes were adapting to the dim light and I saw that most of the crowd were 
Charin plainsmen and chaks; one or two wore Dry - towner shirtcloaks, and J even 
thought I saw an Earthman. They were all squat­ting around small crescent shaped 
tables, and all in­tently gazing at a flickery spot of light near the front. I 
saw an empty place at one table, and let myself drop there, finding the floor 
soft, as if cushioned. On each table, small, smudging pastilles were burning, 
and from these cones of ash - tipped fire came the steamy, swimmy smoke that 
filled the darkness with strange colors. Beside me, an immature chak girl was 
kneeling, her fettered hands strained tightly back at her sides, her naked 
breasts pierced with jeweled rings; beneath the pallid fur, cream - colored, 
flowing around her pointed ears, the exquisite animal face was quite mad.
There were cups and decanters on the table, and another woman tilted a stream of 
pale phosphorescent fluid into one cup, and proffered it to me.
I took a sip, then another; it was cold and pleasant, and not till the second 
swallow turned bitter on my tongue did I know what I tasted. I pretended to 
swal­low while the woman's phosphorescent eyes were fixed on me, then somehow 
contrived to spill the foul stuff down my shirt. I was wary even of the fumes, 
but there was nothing else I could do. It was shallavan, the reeking drug 
outlawed on every half - way decent planet in the Galaxy.
The scene itself looked like the worst nightmare of a drug - dreamer, ablaze 
with the colors of the smoking incense, the swaying crowd and their monotonous 
cries. Quite suddenly there was a blaze of orchid light and someone screamed in 
raving ecstasy, 'Wo ki na Nebran n'hai Kamaina!"
"Kamaieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeena!" shrilled the en­tranced mob.
Evarin stood in the blaze of the tights.
The Toy maker was as I had seen him last, cat - smooth, gracefully alien, 
shrouded in a ripple of giddy crimsons. Behind him there was a blackness. I 
waited until the painful blaze of the lights abated, then, strain­ing to see 
past him, I got my worst shock.
A woman stood there, naked to the waist, her hands ritually fettered with little 
chains that stirred and clashed musically as she walked, stiff - legged, in a 
frozen dream. Hair like black glass combed into metallic waves banded her brow, 
and naked shoulders, and her eyes were crimson . . .
. . . and her eyes lived, in the dead face. They lived and they were mad with 
terror although the lips curved in a placid, dreaming smile.
Miellyn.
I realized that Evarin had been speaking for some time in that dialect I could 
barely understand. His arms were flung high, and his cloak went spilling away 
from them, rippling like something alive.
"Our world - an old world - "
"Kamaieeeena!" whimpered the shrill chorus.
"... humans, all humans, nothing but humans. They would make slaves of us all, 
slaves to the Chil­dren of the Ape . . ."
I blinked and rubbed my eyes to clear them of the incense fumes. I hoped what I 
saw was an optical illusion, drug - born. Something huge, something dark, was 
hovering over the girl. She stood placid, hands clasped on her chains, the 
wreathing smoke glimmering around her jewels, but her eyes writhed and im­plored 
in the still, frozen face.
Then something, I can only call it a sixth sense, warned me that there was 
someone outside that door. I'd been followed, probably by the Legate's orders; 
my follower, tracing me here, had gone away and returned, with reinforcements.
Someone struck a blow on the door, and a stento­rian voice bawled. "Open up, 
there! In the name of the Terran Empire!"
The chanting broke off in ragged quavers. Evarin glanced around, startled and 
wary. Somewhere a woman screamed; the lights abruptly went out, and a stam­pede 
started in the room. I thrust my way forward, with elbows and knees and 
shoulders, butting through the crowd. A dusky emptiness opened, and yawned, and 
I got a glimpse of sunlight and open sky, and knew that Evarin had stepped into 
somewhere and was gone. The banging on the door sounded like a whole regiment of 
spaceforce. I dived toward the shimmer of little stars which marked Miellyn's 
tiara in the darkness, braving that black horror which hovered above her, and 
encountered rigid girl - flesh, cold as death.
I grabbed her, and ducked to the side. Every native building on Wolf has half - 
a - dozen concealed entrances and exits, and I know where to look for them. I 
pushed one, and found myself standing in a dark, peaceful street. One lonely 
moon was setting, low over the rooftops. I put Miellyn on her feet, but she 
moaned and leaned limply against me. I took off my shirtcloak and put it around 
her naked shoulders, then hoisted her in my arms. There was a chak - run cook 
shop down the street, a place I had once known, with an evil reputation and 
worse food, but it was quiet, and stayed open all night. I turned in at the 
door, bending under the low lintel.
The inside room was smoky and foul - smelling; I dumped Miellyn on one of the 
circular couches, sent the frowsy waiter for two bowls of noodles and coffee, 
handed him a few more coins than the food would warrant, and told him to leave 
us alone. He drew down the shutters and went.
I stared at the inert girl for a few seconds, then shrugged and started to eat 
one bowl of the noodles; my own head was still swimming with the fumes of 
incense and drug, and I wanted it clear. I wasn't quite sure what I would do, 
but I had Evarin's right - hand girl, and I meant to use her.
The noodles were greasy, but they were hot, and I ate all of one bowl before 
Miellyn stirred and whim­pered and put up one hand, with a little musical 
clash­ing of chains, to her hair. Finding that the folds of my shirtcloak 
interfered, she made a convulsive move­ment and stared around her with growing 
bewilderment and dismay.
"You! What am I - "
"There was a riot," I said briefly, "and Evarin ditched you. And you can stop 
thinking what you're thinking. I put my cloak on you because you were bare to 
the waist and it didn't look so good." I stopped to think that over, then 
grinned and amended, "I mean, I couldn't haul you around the street that way, it 
looked good enough."
To my amazement she gave a shaky giggle. "If you'll - "and held out her fettered 
hands. I chuckled and snapped the links. It didn't take much strength -  they 
were symbolic ornaments, not real chains, and many Wolf women wear them all the 
time.
Miellyn drew up her draperies and fastened them so that she was decently 
covered, then tossed me back my shirtcloak. "Rakhal, when I saw you there - "
"Later." I shoved the bowl of noodles toward her.
"Eat it," I ordered, "you're still doped; the food will clear your head." I 
picked up one of the mugs of coffee, and emptied it at a single swallow. "What 
were you doing in that place?"
Without warning she flung herself across the table, throwing her arms around my 
neck. For a minute, startled, I let her cling, then reached up and firmly 
unfastened her hands. "None of that, now. I fell for it once, and it landed me 
in the middle of the mud pie."
Her fingers clutched at me with a feverish, tense grip. "Please, please listen 
to me! Have you still got the bird, the Toy? You haven't set it off, yet? Don't, 
don't, don't, don't, Rakhal, you don't know what Evarin is, what he's doing - " 
the words poured out of her in a flood, uncontrollable and desperate. "He's won 
so many men like you - don't let him have you too, they say you're an honest 
man, you worked once for Terra, the Terrans would believe you if you went to 
them and told them - Rakhal, take me to the Terran zone, take me there, take me 
there where they'll protect me from Evarin - "
At first I had leaned forward to protest, then waited and let the torrent of 
entreaty run on and on. At last she lay quiet, exhausted, her head fallen 
forward against my shoulder, her hands still clutching at me. The musky 
shallavan mingled with the flower - scents of her hair. At last, heavily, I 
said, "Kid, you and your Toymaker have both got me all wrong. I'm not Rakhal 
Sensar."
"You're not - " she drew back, regarding me in dismay and disbelief. "Then who - 
?"
"Race Cargill. Terran Intelligence."
She stared at me, her mouth wide like a child's.
Then she laughed. She laughed - I thought she was hysterical, and stared at her 
in consternation. Then, as her wide red eyes met mine, with all the mischief of 
Wolf illogic - I started to laugh.
"Cargill - you can take me to the Terrans where Evarin - "
"Damn!" I exploded, "I can't take you anywhere, girl, I've got to find Rakhal!" 
I hauled out the Toy and slapped it down on the greasy table. "I don't suppose 
you know which of us this is supposed to kill?"
"I know nothing about the Toys."
"You know plenty about the Toymaker," I said sourly.
"I thought so. Until last night." She burst out, in an explosion of passionate 
anger, "It's not a religion! It's a front! For drugs and politics and every 
other filthy thing! I've heard a lot about Rakhal Sensar! Whatever you think of 
him, he's too decent to be mixed up in that!"
The pattern was beginning to take shape in my mind. Rakhal had been on the trail 
of the matter - transmitter, and had fallen afoul of the Toymaker. Evarin's 
words, you were very clever at escaping our surveillance for a while, made sense 
to me now; Juli had given me the clue. He smashed Rindy's Toys. It had sounded 
like the act of a madman, out it made plain, good sense.
I said, "There's some distance limitation on this thing, I understand. If I lock 
it inside a steel box and drop it in the desert, I'll guarantee it won't bother 
anybody. Miellyn, I don't suppose you'd care to have a try at stealing the other 
one for me?"
"Why should you worry about Sensar's wife?" she flashed.
For some reason it seemed important to set her straight. "My sister," I 
explained. The thing to do, I suppose, is to find Rakhal first - " I stopped, 
remem­bering something. "I can find Rakhal with that scan­ning device in the 
workshops. Take me to the Master - shrine, will you? Where's the nearest street 
- shrine?"
"No! Oh, no, I don't dare!"
I had to argue and plead, and finally threaten her, reminding her that except 
for me she would have been torn to pieces or worse, by a crowd of drugged and 
raving fanatics, before she finally consented to take me to a transmitter. She 
was shaking when she set her foot into the patterned stones. "I know what Evarin 
can do!" Then her red mouth twitched, in tremulous mischief. "You'll have to 
stand closer than that, the transmitters are meant for only one person!"
I stooped and put my arm round her. "Like this?"
"Like this," she whispered, pressing herself against me. A swirl of dizzy 
darkness swung around my head; the street vanished, and we stepped out into the 
terminal room in the Master - shrine, under a skylight dark­ened with the last 
splinters of the setting sun. Distant little hammering noises made a ringing in 
my ears.
Maellyn whispered, "Evarin's not here, but he might jump through at any minute!" 
I paid no attention.
"Exactly where on the planet are we?"
Miellyn shook her head. "No one knows that except Evarin himself. There are no 
doors, just the trans­mitters - when we want to go outside, we jump through 
them. The scanning device is through there - we'll have to go through the Little 
Ones' workroom." She opened the door of the workroom, and we walked through.
Not for years had I known that special feeling -  thousands of eyes, all boring 
holes in the center of my back. I was sweating by the time we reached the 
farther door and it closed, safe and blessedly opaque behind us. Miellyn was 
shivering with reaction.
"Steady," I warned. "We've still got to get out. Where's that scanner?"
She touched the panel. "I'm not sure I can focus it accurately, though. Evarin's 
never let me touch it."
"How does it work?"
"The principle is just the same as the matter - transmitter; that is, it lets 
you look through to any­where, but without jumping. It uses a tracer mechanism, 
just as the Toys do," she added. "If Rakhal's electrical - impulse pattern were 
on file anywhere, I could - wait! 1 know how we can do it! Give me the Toy." I 
drew, it out; she took it quickly and unwrapped it. "Here's a good, quick way to 
find out which of you this bird is intended to kill!"
I looked at the fledgling thing, soft and innocent hi her palm. "Suppose it s 
turned on me?"
"I wasn't going to set it off." Miellyn pushed aside the feathers, revealing a 
tiny crystal set into the bird's skull. "The memory - crystal. If it's tuned to 
your nerve - patterns, you'll see yourself in the scanner, as if it were a 
mirror. If you see Rakhal - "
She touched the crystal against the surface of the screen. Little flickers of 
"snow" danced across the clearing panel; then, abruptly, a picture dropped into 
focus, the turned - away back of a man in a leather jacket. The man turned, 
slowly, and I saw first, a familiar profile, then saw the profile become a 
scarred mask, more hideous than my own. His lips were mov­ing; he was talking to 
someone beyond the range of the lens.
Miellyn asked, "Is that - "
"It's Rakhal, yes. Move the focus, if you can, try to get a look out of a 
window, or something. Charin's a big city. If we could get a look at a landmark 
- "
Rakhal went on talking, soundlessly, like television without sound. Abruptly 
Miellyn said "There!" She had brought the scanning device within range of a 
window; Rakhal was inside a room that looked out on a high pylon and two or 
three uprights that looked like a bridge. I recognized the place at once, and so 
did Miellyn.
"The Bridge of Summer Snows, in Charin. I can find him now. Come on, turn if 
off, and let's get out of here." I was turning away from the screen when Miellyn 
gave a smothered scream.
"Look!"
Rakhal had turned his back on our scanning device, and for the first time we 
could see the person he was talking to. A hunched and catlike shoulder, twisted, 
revealing a sinuous neck, a handsome and arrogant face - 
"Evarin!" I swore. "He knows, then, that I'm not Rakhal. He's probably known all 
along. Come on, girl, we're getting out of here." She shoved the silk - wrapped 
bird into her skirt pocket and we ran through the workroom. We banged the 
workroom door shut behind us, and I shoved a heavy divan against it, barricading 
it shut.
Miellyn was already inside the recess where the Toad - god squatted. "There is a 
street - shrine just beyond the Bridge of Summer Snow. Hold me, hold me tight, 
it's a long jump - " suddenly she froze in my arms, with a convulsive shudder. 
"Evarin - he's jumping in! Quick!"
Space reeled around us.
We landed inside a street - shrine; I glimpsed the pylon, and the bridge, and 
the rising sun; then there was the giddy, internal wrench, a blast of icy air 
whistled around us; and we found ourselves gazing out at the Polar mountains, 
ringed in their eternal sunlight.
We jumped again, the wrenching sickness of disorientation forcing a moan from 
the girl, and dark clouds shivered around us; I looked out on an unfamiliar 
expanse of sand and wasteland and dust - bleared stars. Miellyn whimpered. 
"Evarin knows what I'm doing, he's jumping us all around the planet, he can work 
the controls with his mind . . . Psychokinetics ... I can do it, a little, only 
I've never . . . oh, hang on to me, tight, tight, I've never dared do this - "
Then began one of the most amazing duels ever fought. Miellyn would make some 
tiny movement; we would fall, blind and dizzy, through the blackness, half - way 
through the giddy spin, a new direction would wrench at us, and we would be 
thrust elsewhere - and look out on a different street. One instant we were in 
the Kharsa - I actually saw the door of the spaceport cafe, and smelled hot 
coffee - and an instant later it was blinding noon, with crimson fronds waving 
over­head, over the roofs of gilt temples. We froze and burned, moonlight, noon, 
dim twilight, in the terrible giddiness of hyperspace.
Then, suddenly, I caught a glimpse of the pylori, the bridge; luck or an 
oversight had landed us again for half a second in Charin. The blackness started 
to reel down again, but my reflexes are fast, and I made one swift, scrabbling 
step forward. We lurched, then sprawled, locked together, on the sharp stones of 
the bridge outside the street - shrine; bruised and bloody, but alive - and at 
our destination!
I lifted Miellyn to her feet; her eyes were dizzy with pain. Clinging together, 
the ground swaying madly under our feet, we fled along the Bridge of Summer 
Snows. At the far side, I looked up at the pylon. Judging by the angle, the 
place where we'd seen Rakhal couldn’t be far away. In this street there was a 
wine shop, a silk market, and one small private house. I walked up, and banged 
on the door.
Silence. I knocked again. From within there came a child's shrill question, a 
deeper voice hushing it, and the door opened, to reveal a scarred face that drew 
back into a hideous facsimile of a grin.
"I thought it might be you, Cargill," Rakhal said. "You've taken longer than I 
expected. Come in."
He hadn't changed much, except for the crimson,
'y scars that drew up mouth and nostril and jawline. face was worse than mine. 
The mask tensed as he saw Miellyn, but he backed away to let us in, and shut the 
door behind us.
A little girl, in a fur smock, stood watching us. She had red hair like Juli's, 
and evidently she knew just who I was, for she looked at me quite calmly, 
without surprise. Had Juli told her about me?
"Rindy," Rakhal said quietly, "go into the other room." The little girl, still 
staring at me, did not move. Rakhal added, in a gentle, curiously moderate 
voice, "Do you still carry a skean, Race?"
I shook my head. "That's Juli's daughter. I'm not going to kill her father under 
her eyes." Suddenly my rage spilled over. "To hell with your damned Dry - town 
blood - feud and codes and your filthy Toad - god!"
Rakhal's voice was harsher now. "Rindy. I told you to get out." I took a step 
toward the little girl. "Don't go, Rindy. I'm going to take her to Juli, Rakhal. 
Rindy, don't you want to go to your mother?" I held out my arms to her.
Rakhal made a menacing gesture; Miellyn darted between us, and picked up Rindy 
hi her arms. The child struggled and whimpered, but Miellyn took two quick steps 
and carried her bodily through an open door.
Rakhal began, slowly, to laugh.
"You're as stupid as ever, Cargill. You still don't realize - I knew Juli would 
come straight to you, if she was frightened enough. I thought it would lure you 
out of hiding - you filthy coward! Six years hiding in the Terran zone! If you'd 
had the guts to walk out with me when I engineered that final deal, we would 
have had the biggest thing on Wolf!"
"Doing Evarin's dirty work?"
"You know damn well that had nothing to do with Evarin. It was for us - and 
Shainsa. Evarin - I might have known he'd get to you! That girl - if you've 
spoiled my plans - " Abruptly he whipped out his skean and came at me. "Son of 
the ape! I might have known better than to depend on you! I'll finish your 
med­dling, this time!"
I felt the skean drive home, slicing flesh and ribs, and staggered back, 
grunting with pain. I grappled with him, forcing back his hand. My side burned 
furi­ously, and I wanted to kill Rakhal and I couldn't, and at the same time I 
was raging because I didn't want to fight the crazy fool, I wasn't even mad at 
him - 
Miellyn flung the door open, shrieking. There was a flutter of silk, and then 
the Toy was darting, a small whirring droning horror, straight at Rakhal's eyes. 
There was no time even to warn him. I bent and butted him in the stomach; he 
grunted, doubled, and fell, out of the path of the diving Toy. It whirred in 
frustration, hovered, dived again. Rakhal writhed in agony, drawing up his 
knees, clawing inside his shirt. "You damned - I didn't want to use this - " He 
opened his closed fist, and suddenly there was another Toy in the room. An 
identical fledgling bird, and this one was diving at me - and in a split second 
I understood. Evarin had made the same arrangement with Rakhal, as with me.
From the door came a child's wild shriek.
"Daddy!"
Abruptly the birds collapsed in mid - air and went limp. They fell, inanimate, 
to the floor, and lay there, quivering. Rindy dashed across the room, her small 
skirts flying, and grabbed one of the vicious things in each hand. She stood 
there, tears pouring down her little face. Dark veins stood out like narrow 
cords on her temples. "Break them, quick. I can't hang on to them any longer - " 
Rakhal grabbed one of the Toys from a little fist, and smashed it under his 
heel. It shrilled and died. The other screamed like a living bird as his foot 
scrunched on the tiny feathers. He drew an agonized breath, his hands clutching 
his belly where I'd butted him.
"That blow was foul, Cargill, but I guess I know why you did it. You - " he 
stopped and said shame­facedly," You saved my life. You know what that means. 
Did you know you were doing it?" I nodded. It meant the end of the blood - feud. 
How­ever we had wronged one another, this ended it, fi­nally and forever.
He said, "Better get that skean out of your ribs, you damn' fool. Here - " with 
a quick jerk he drew it out. "Not more than half an inch. Your rib must have 
turned it. Just a flesh wound. Rindy - " She sobbed noisily, hiding her head on 
his shoulder. "The other Toys . . . hurt you . . . when I was mad at you, Daddy, 
only ..." she dug her fists in her red eyes. "I wasn't that mad at you, I wasn't 
that mad at anybody . . . not even . . . him . . ."
He said over her head, "The Toys activate a child's subconscious resentments 
against his parents. That also means a child can control them - for a few 
seconds; no adult can." "Juli told me you threatened Rindy - "
He chuckled. "What else could I have done that would have scared Juli enough to 
send her to you? Juli's proud, nearly as proud as you, you stiff-necked son of 
the ape! She had to be desperate."
He tossed it all aside with a shrug. "You've got Miellyn to take you through the 
transmitters. Go back to the Master shrine, and tell Evarin I'm dead. In the 
Trade City, they think I'm Cargill; I can go in and out as I choose. I'll 'vise 
Magnusson, and have him send soldiers to guard the street - shrines; Evarin may 
try to escape through one of them."
"Terra hasn't enough guards on all Wolf to cover the street - shrines hi Charm 
alone," I objected, "and I can't go back with Miellyn." I explained why, and 
Rakhal pursed his lips and whistled when I described the fight in the 
transmitters.
"You have all the luck! I've never been near enough to be sure how the 
transmitters work, and I'll bet you didn't begin to understand! Well, we'll do 
it the hard way. We'll face Evarin down in his own shrine - if Rindy's with us, 
we needn't worry."
I was shocked at his casual suggestion. "You'd take a child into that?"
"What else is there to do?" Rakhal inquired logi­cally, "Rindy can control the 
Toys, and neither you nor I could do that, if Evarin should decide to throw his 
whole arsenal at us!" He called Rindy to him again, and spoke softly. She looked 
from her father to me, and back again to her father, then smiled, and stretched 
out her small hand to me.
While we hunted for another street - shrine - Miellyn had some esoteric reason 
for not wanting to use the same one we'd landed in - I asked Rakhal point - 
blank, "Are you working for Terra? Or for the resistance movement? Or for the 
Dry - towns?"
He shook his head. "I'm working for myself. I just want one thing, Race. I want 
the Dry - towns, and the rest of Wolf, to have a voice in their own government. 
Any planet which makes a substantial contribution to Galactic science, by the 
laws of the Terran Empire, gets the status of an independent commonwealth. If a 
Dry - towner discovers anything as valuable as a matter - transmitter, Wolf gets 
dominion status. And inciden­tally, I get a nice fat bonus, and an official 
position."
Before I could answer, Miellyn touched my arm. "This is the shrine."
Rakhal picked up Rindy, and the three of us crowded close together. The street 
swayed and vanished, and I felt the familiar dip and swirl of blackness. Rindy 
screamed with terror and pain, then the world straight­ened out again. Rindy was 
crying, dabbing smeary fists at her face. "Daddy, my nose is bleeding - "
Miellyn bent and wiped the blood from the snubby nose. Rakhal set his daughter 
on her feet.
"The chak workroom, Race. Smash everything you see. Rindy, if anything comes at 
us, stop it - stop it, quick!"
Her wide round eyes blinked, and she nodded, a solemn little nod. We flung open 
the door of the elves' workshop with a shout. The ringing of the fairy anvils 
shattered into a thousand dissonances as I kicked over a workbench and half - 
finished Toys smashed in confu­sion to the floor.
The chaks scattered like rabbits before our advance. I smashed half - finished 
Toys, tools, filigree and jew­els, stamping everything out with my heavy boots. 
A tiny doll, proportioned like a woman, dashed at me, shrilling in a high 
supersonic shriek; I put my foot on her and ground the life out of her. She 
screamed like a living woman as she came apart. Her blue eyes rolled from her 
head and lay on the floor watching me, still alive; I crushed the blue jewels 
under my foot.
I was drunk with crushing and shattering and ruin­ing when I heard Miellyn 
shriek in warning, and turned to see Evarin standing in the doorway. He raised 
both hands in a sardonic gesture, then turned, and with a queer, loping, inhuman 
run, headed for the transmitter.
"Rindy," Rakhal panted, "can you block the trans­mitter?"
Instead Rindy screamed. "We've got to get out! The house is falling down! It's 
going to fall on us - look -  look at the roof!"
Transfixed by her horror, I looked up, to see a wide rift opening in the 
ceiling. The skylight shattered, broke, and daylight poured through the 
cracking, translucent walls. Rakhal snatched up Rindy, protecting her from the 
falling debris with his head and shoulders; I grabbed Miellyn around the waist, 
and we ran for the rift that was widening in the cracking wall. We shoved 
through, just before the roof caved in, the walls collapsed and we found 
ourselves standing on a bare, grassy hillside, looking down in shock and horror, 
as, below us, section after section of what was, apparently, bare hill and rock 
caved in and collapsed into dusty rubble.
Miellyn cried hoarsely, "Run! Run - hurry!"
I didn't understand, but I ran.
Then the shock of a great explosion rocked the earth, hurling me to the ground, 
Miellyn falling in a heap on top of me. Rakhal stumbled, went down to his knees. 
When I could see again, I looked at the hillside.
There was nothing left of Evarin's hideaway, or of the Master - shrine of 
Nebran, but a great, gaping hole, still oozing smoke and black dust.
"Destroyed! All destroyed!" Rakhal raged. "The workroom, all the science of the 
Toys, the secret of the transmitters - " He beat his fists furiously. "Our one 
chance to learn - "
"You're lucky you got out alive," said Miellyn qui­etly. "Where are We?"
I looked down, and stared in amazement. Spread out below us lay the Kharsa, and 
straight ahead, the white skyscraper of the Terra HQ and the big space­port. I 
pointed.
"Down there. Rakhal, you can make your peace with the Terrans, and with Juli. 
And you, Miellyn - "
Her smile was shaky. "I can't go into the Terran Zone like this. Have you a 
comb? Rakhal, lend me your shirtcloak, my robes are torn, and - "
"Stupid female, worrying about a thing like that at a time like this!" Rakhal's 
look was like murder. I put my comb into her hand, then, abruptly saw something 
in the symbols embroidered across her breasts.
I reached out, and ripped the cloth away.
"Cargill!" she protested angrily, turning crimson and covering her bared breasts 
with both hands. "Is this the place - and before a child, too - "
1 hardly heard her. "Look," I exclaimed, snatching at Rakhal's sleeve, "look at 
the symbols embroidered into the God! You can read the old nonhuman glyphs, I've 
seen you do it! I'll bet the formula is written out there for everyone to read! 
Look here, Rakhal! I can't read it, but I'll bet it's the equations for the 
matter - transmitter."
Rakhal bent his head over the torn robe. "I believe you have it! he exclaimed, 
shaken and breathless. "It may take years to translate the glyph, but I can do 
it! I'll do it, or die trying!" His scarred face looked al­most handsome, and I 
grinned at him.
"If Juli leaves enough of you, once she finds out what you did to her. Look, 
Rindy's asleep. Poor little kid, we'd better get her down to her mother."
We walked abreast, and Rakhal said softly, "Like old times, Race."
It wasn't like old times, and I knew he would see it, too, once his exultation 
sobered. I had outgrown my love for intrigue, and I had a feeling this was 
Rakhal's last adventure, too. It would take him, as he said, years to work out 
the equations for the transmitter. And I had a feeling that my own solid, 
ordinary desk was going to look pretty good to me in the morning.
But I knew now, that I'd never leave Wolf. It was my own beloved sun that was 
rising. My sister was waiting down below, and I'd given her back her child. My 
friend was walking at my side. What more could a man want?
I looked at Miellyn, and smiled.
(1957)
 
 
The Wind People
 
It had been a long layover for the Starholm's crew, hunting heavy elements for 
fuel - eight months, on an idyllic green paradise of a planet; a soft, windy, 
whis­pering world, inhabited only by trees and winds. But in the end it 
presented its own unique problem.
Specifically, it presented Captain Merrihew with the problem of Robin, male, 
father unknown, who had been born the day before, and a month prematurely, to 
Dr. Helen Murray.
Merrihew found her lying abed in the laboratory shelter, pale and calm, with the 
child beside her.
The little shelter, constructed roughly of green planks, looked out on the 
clearing which the Starholm had used as a base of operations during the layover; 
a beautiful place at the bottom of a wide valley, in the curve of a broad, deep 
- flowing river. The crew, tired of being shipbound, had built half a dozen such 
huts and shacks in these eight months.
Merrihew glared down at Helen. He snorted, "This is a fine situation. You, of 
all the people in the whole damned crew - the ship's doctor! It's - it's - " 
Inarticu­late with rage, he fell back on a ridiculously inade­quate phrase. 
"It's - criminal carelessness!"
"I know." Helen Murray, too young and far too lovely for a ship's officer on a 
ten - year cruise, still looked weak and white, and her voice was a gentle 
shadow of its crisp self. "I'm afraid four years in space made me careless."
Merrihew, brooded, looking down at her. Some­thing about ship - gravity 
conditions, while not affecting potency, made conception impossible; no child 
had ever been conceived in space and none ever would. On planet layovers, the 
effect wore off very slowly; only after three months aground had Dr. Murray 
started routine administration of anticeptin to the twenty - two women of the 
crew, herself included. At that time she had been still unaware that she herself 
was already carrying a child.
Outside, the leafy forest whispered and rustled, and Merrihew knew Helen had 
forgotten his existence again. The day - old child was tucked up in one of her 
rolled coveralls at her side. To Merrihew, he looked like a skinned monkey, but 
Helen's eyes smoldered as her hands moved gently over the tiny round head.
He stood and listened to the winds and said at random, "These shacks will fall 
to pieces in another month. It doesn't matter, we'll have taken off by then."
Dr. Chao Lin came into the shack, an angular woman of thirty - five. She said, 
"Company, Helen? Well, it's about time. Here, let me take Robin."
Helen said in weak protest, "You're spoiling me, Lin."
"It will do you good," Chao Lin returned. Merrihew, in a sudden surge of fury 
and frustration, exploded. "Damn it, Lin, you're making it all worse. He'll die 
when we go into overdrive, you know, as well as I do!"
Helen sat up, clutching Robin protectively. "Are you proposing to drown him like 
a kitten?"
"Helen, I'm not proposing anything. I'm stating a fact."
"But it's not a fact. He won't die in overdrive be­cause he won't be aboard when 
we go into overdrive!"
Merrihew looked at Lin helplessly, but his face soft­ened. "Shall we - put him 
to sleep and bury him here?"
The woman's face turned white. "No!" she cried in passionate protest, and Lin 
bent to disengage her fran­tic grip.
"Helen, you'll hurt him. Put him down. There."
Merrihew looked down at her, troubled, and said, "We can't just abandon him to 
die slowly, Helen - "
"Who says I'm going to abandon him?"  Merrihew asked slowly, "Are you planning 
to des­ert?" He added, after a minute, "There's a chance he'll survive. After 
all, his very birth was against all medical precedent. Maybe - "
"Captain" - Helen's voice sounded desperate - "even drugged, no child under ten 
has ever endured the shift into hyperspace drive. A newborn would die in 
sec­onds." She clasped Robin to her again and said, "It's the only way - you 
have Lin for a doctor, Reynolds can handle my collateral duties. This planet is 
unin­habited, the climate is mild, and we couldn't possibly starve." Her face, 
so gentle, was suddenly like rock. "Enter my death in the log, if you want to."
Merrihew looked from Helen to Lin, and said, "Helen, you're insane!"
She said, "Even if I'm sane now, I wouldn't be long if I had to abandon Robin." 
The wild note had died out of her voice, and she spoke rationally, but 
inflexi­bly. "Captain Merrihew, to get me aboard the Starholm, you will have to 
have me drugged or taken by force; I promise you I won't go any other way. And 
if you do that - and if Robin is left behind, or dies in overdrive, just so you 
will have my services as a doctor - then I solemnly swear that I will kill 
myself at the first opportunity."
"My God," said Merrihew, "you are insane!"
Helen gave a very tiny shrug. "Do you want a madwoman aboard?"
Chao Lin said quietly, "Captain, I don't see any other way. We would have had to 
arrange it that way if Helen had actually died in childbirth. Of two 
unsat­isfactory solutions, we must choose the less harmful." And Merrihew knew 
that he had no real choice.
"I still think you're both crazy," he blustered, but it was surrender, and Helen 
knew it.
Ten days after the Starholm took off, young Colin Reynolds, technician, 
committed suicide by the messy procedure of slicing his jugular vein, which - in 
zero gravity - distributed several quarts of blood in big round globules all 
over his cabin. He left an incoherent note.
Merrihew put the note in the disposal and Chao Lin put the blood in the ship's 
blood bank for surgery, and they hushed it up as an accident; but Merrihew had 
the unpleasant feeling that the layover on the green and windy planet was going 
to become a legend, spread in whispers by the crew. And it did, but that is 
another story.
Robin was two years old when he first heard the voices in the wind. He pulled at 
his mother's arms and crooned softly, in imitation.
"What is it, lovey?"
"Pretty." He crooned again to the distant murmur­ing sound.
Helen smiled vaguely and patted the round cheek. Robin, his infant imagination 
suddenly distracted, said, "Hungry. Robin hungry. Berries."
"Berries after you eat," Helen promised absently, and picked him up. Robin 
tugged at her arm.
"Mommy pretty, too!"
She laughed, a rosy and smiling young Diana. She was happy on the solitary 
planet; they lived quite comfortably in one of the larger shacks, and only a 
little frown line between her eyes bore witness to the terror which had closed 
down on her in the first months, when every new day had been some new struggle - 
 against weakness, against unfamiliar sounds, against loneliness and dread. 
Nights when she lay wakeful, sweating with terror while the winds rose and fell 
again and her imagination gave them voices, bleak days when she wandered dazedly 
around the shack or stared moodily at Robin. There had been moments -  only 
fleeting, and penanced with hours of shame and regret - when she thought that 
even the horror of los­ing Robin in those first days would have been less than 
the horror of spending the rest of her life alone here, when she had wondered 
why Merrihew had not real­ized that she was unbalanced, and forced her to go 
with them; by now, Robin would have been only a mo­ment's painful memory.
Still not strong, knowing she had to be strong for Robin or he would die as 
surely as if she had aban­doned him, she had spent the first months in a 
som­nambulistic dream. Sometimes she had walked for days at a time in that 
dream; she would wake to find food that she could not remember gathering. 
Somehow, pervasive, the dream voices had taken over; the whis­pering winds had 
been full of voices and even hands.
She had fallen ill and lain for days sick and deliri­ous, and had heard a voice 
which hardly seemed to be her own, saying that if she died the wind voices would 
care for Robin . . . and then the shock and irrational­ity of that had startled 
her out of delirium, agonized and trembling, and she pulled herself upright and 
cried out, "No!"
And the shimmer of eyes and voices had faded again into vague echoes, until 
there was only the stir of sunlight on the leaves, and Robin, chubby and naked, 
kicking in the sunlight, cooing with his hands outstretched to the rustle of 
leaves and shadows.
She had known, then, that she had to get well. She had never heard the wind 
voices again, and her crisp, scientific mind rejected the fanciful theory that 
if she only believed in the wind voices she would see their forms and hear their 
words clearly. And she rejected them so thoroughly that when she heard them 
speak, she shut them away from her mind, and after a time heard them no longer, 
except in restless dreams.
By now she had accepted the isolation and the beauty of their world, and begun 
to make a happy life for Robin.
For lack of other occupation last summer - though the winter was mild and there 
was no lack of fruits and roots even then - Helen had patiently snared male and 
female of small animals like rabbits, and now she had a pen of them. They 
provided a change of diet, and after a few smelly unsuccessful experiments she 
had devised a way to supply their fur pelts. She made no effort at gardening, 
though when Robin was older she might try that. For the moment, it was enough 
that they were healthy and safe and protected.
Robin was listening again. Helen bent her ear, sharp­ened by the silence, but 
heard only the rustle of wind and leaves; saw only falling brightness along a 
silvered tree - trunk.
Wind? When there were no branches stirring?
"Ridiculous," she said sharply, then snatched up the baby boy and squeezed him 
before hoisting him astride her hip. "Mommy doesn't mean you, Robin. Let's look 
for berries."
But soon she realized that his head was tipped back and that he was listening, 
again, to some sound she could not hear.
On what she said was Robin's fifth birthday, Helen had made a special bed for 
him in another room of the building. He missed the warmth of Helen's body, and 
the comforting sound of her breathing; for Robin, since birth, had been a 
wakeful child.
Yet, on the first night alone, Robin felt curiously freed. He did something he 
had never dared do be­fore, for fear of waking Helen; he slipped from his bed 
and stood in the doorway, looking into the forest.
The forest was closer to the doorway now; Robin could fuzzily remember when the 
clearing had been wider. Now, slowly, beyond the garden patch which Helen kept 
cleared, the underbrush and saplings were growing back, and even what Robin 
called "the burned place" was covered with new sparse grass.
Robin was accustomed to being alone during the day - even in his first year, 
Helen had had to leave him alone, securely fastened in the house, or inside a 
little tight - fenced yard. But he was not used to being alone at night.
Far off in the forest, he could hear the whispers of the other people. Helen 
said there were no other people, but Robin knew better, because he could hear 
their voices on the wind, like fragments of the songs Helen sang at bedtime. And 
sometimes he could al­most see them in the shadowy spots.
Once when Helen had been sick, a long time ago, and Robin had run helplessly 
from the fenced yard to the inside room and back again, hungry and dirty and 
furious because Helen only slept on the bed with her eyes closed, rousing up now 
and then to whimper like he did when he fell down and skinned his knee, the 
winds and voices had come into the very house; Robin had hazy memories of 
soothing voices, of hands that touched him more softly than Helen's hands. But 
he could not quite remember.
Now that he could hear them so clearly, he would go and find the other people. 
And then if Helen was sick again, there would be someone else to play with him 
and look after him. He thought gleefully, Won't Helen be surprised? and darted 
off across the clearing.
Helen woke, roused not by a sound but by a silence. She no longer heard Robin's 
soft breaths from the alcove, and after a moment she realized something else:
The winds were silent.
Perhaps, she thought, a storm was coming. Some change in air pressure could 
cause this stillness - but Robin? She tip - toed to the alcove; as she had 
sus­pected, his bed was empty.
Where could he be? In the clearing? With a storm coming? She slid her feet into 
handmade sandals and ran outside, her quivering call ringing out through the 
silent forest:
"Robin - oh, Robin!"
Silence. And far away a little ominous whisper. And for the first time since 
that first frightening year of loneliness, she felt lost, deserted in an alien 
world. She ran across the clearing, looking around wildly, trying to decide 
which way he could have wandered. Into the forest? What if he had strayed toward 
the riverbank? There was a place where the bank crum­bled away, down toward the 
rapids - her throat closed convulsively, and her call was almost a shriek:
"Oh, Robin! Robin, darling! Robin!"
She ran through the paths worn by then -  feet, hear­ing snatches of rustle, 
winds and leaves suddenly vocal in the cold moonlight around her. It was the 
first time since the spaceship left them that Helen had ventured out into the 
night of their world. She called again, her voice cracking in panic.
"Robin!"
A sudden stray gleam revealed a glint of white, and a child stood in the middle 
of the path. Helen gasped with relief and ran to snatch up her son - then fell 
back in dismay. It was not Robin who stood there. The child was naked, about a 
head shorter than Robin, and female.
There was something curious about the bare and gleaming flesh, as if she could 
see the child only hi the full flush of the moonlight. A round, almost 
expres­sionless face was surrounded by a mass of colorless streaming hair, the 
exact color of the moonlight. Hel­en's audible gasp startled her to a stop: she 
shut her eyes convulsively, and when she opened them the path was black and 
empty and Robin was running down the track toward her.
Helen caught him up, with a strangled cry, and ran, clasping him to her breast, 
back down the path to their shack. Inside, she barred the door and laid Robin 
down in her own bed, and threw herself down shiver­ing, too shaken to speak, too 
shaken to scold him, curiously afraid to question. I had a hallucination, she 
told herself, a hallucination, another dream, a dream. . .
A dream, like the other Dream. She signified it to herself as The Dream because 
it was not like any other dream she had ever had. She had dreamed it first 
before Robin's birth, and been ashamed to speak of it to Chao Lin, fearing the 
common - sense skepticism of the older woman.
On their tenth night on the green planet (the Starholm was a dim recollection 
now), when Mernhew's scien­tists had been convinced that the little world was 
safe, without wild beasts or diseases or savage natives, the crew had requested 
permission to camp in the valley clearing beside the river. Permission granted, 
they had gone apart in couples almost as usual, and even those who had no 
enduring liaison at the moment had found a partner for the night.
It must have been that night...
Colin Reynolds was two years younger than Helen, and their attachment, enduring 
over a few months of ship time, was based less on mutual passion than on a sort 
of boyish need in him, a sort of impersonal femi­nine solicitude in Helen. All 
her affairs had been like that, companionable, comfortable, but never 
passion­ate. Curiously enough, Helen was a woman capable of passion, of great 
depths of devotion; but no man had ever roused it and now no man ever would. 
Only Robin's birth had touched her deeply pent emotions.
But that night, when Colin Reynolds was sleeping, Helen stayed restlessly awake, 
hearing the unquiet stirring of wind on the leaves. After a time she wan­dered 
down to the water's edge, staying a cautious distance from the shore - for the 
cliff crumbled dan­gerously - and stretched herself out to listen to the wind - 
voices. And after a time she fell asleep, and had The Dream, which was to return 
to her again and again.
Helen thought of herself as a scientist, without room for fantasies, and that 
was why she called it, fiercely, a dream; a dream born of some undiagnosed 
conflict in her. Even to herself Helen would not recall it in full.
There had been a man, and to her it seemed that he was part of the green and 
windy world, and he had found her sleeping by the river. Even in her drowsy 
state, Helen had suspected that perhaps one of the other crew members, like 
herself sleepless and drawn to the shining water, had happened upon her there, 
such things were not impossible, manners and mores being what they were among 
starship crew's.
But to her, half dreaming, there had been some strangeness about him, which 
prevented her from seeing him too clearly even in the brilliant green moonlight. 
No dream and no man had ever seemed so living to her; and it was her fierce 
rationalization of the dream which kept her silent, months later, when she 
discov­ered (to her horror and secret despair) that she was with child. She had 
felt that she would lose the haze and secret delight of the dream if she openly 
acknowl­edged that Colin had fathered her child.
But at first - in the cool green morning that fol­lowed - she had not been at 
all sure it was a dream. Seeing only sunlight and leaves, she had held back from 
speaking, not wanting ridicule; could she have asked each man of the Starholm, 
"Was it you who came to me last night? Because if it was not, there are other 
men on this world, men who cannot be clearly seen even by moonlight."
Severely she reminded herself, Merrihew's men had pronounced the world 
uninhabited, and uninhabited it must be. Five years later, hugging her sleeping 
son close, Helen remembered the dream, examined the content of her fantasy, and 
once again, shivering, re­peated, "I had a hallucination. It was only a dream. A 
dream, because I was alone ..."
When Robin was fourteen years old, Helen told him the story of his birth, and of 
the ship.
He was a tall, silent boy, strong and hardy but not talkative; he heard the 
story almost in silence, and looked at Helen for a long time in silence 
afterward. He finally said in a whisper, "You could have died -  you gave up a 
lot for me, Helen, didn't you?" He knelt and took her face in his hands.
She smiled and drew a little away from him. "Why are you looking at me like 
that, Robin?"
The boy could not put instant words to his thoughts; emotions were not in his 
vocabulary. Helen had taught him everything she knew, but she had always 
con­cealed her feelings from her son. He asked at last, "Why didn't my father 
stay with you?"
"I don't suppose it entered his head," Helen said. "He was needed on the ship. 
Losing me was bad enough."
Robin said passionately, "I'd have stayed!"
The woman found herself laughing. "Well - you did stay, Robin."
He asked, "Am I like my father?"
Helen looked gravely at her son, trying to see the half - forgotten features of 
young Reynolds in the boy's face. No, Robin did not look like Colin Reynolds, 
nor like Helen herself. She picked up his hand in hers; despite his robust 
health, Robin never tanned; his skin was pearly pale, so that in the green 
sunlight it blended into the forest almost invisibly. His hand lay in Hel­en's 
palm like a shadow. She said at last, "No, nothing like him. But under this sun, 
that's to be expected."
Robin said confidently, "I'm like the other people."
"The ones on the ship? They - "
"No," Robin interrupted, "you always said when I was older you'd tell me about 
the other people. I mean the other people here. The ones in the woods. The ones 
you can't see."
Helen stared at the boy in blank disbelief. "What do you mean? There are no 
other people, just us." Then she recalled that every imaginative child invents 
play­mates. Alone, she thought, Robin's always alone, no other children, no 
wonder he's a little - strange. She said quietly, "You dreamed it, Robin."
The boy only stared at her in bleak, blank alien­ation. "You mean," he said, 
"you can't hear them, either?" He got up and walked out of the hut. Helen 
called, but he didn't turn back. She ran after him, catching at his arm, 
stopping him almost by force. She whispered, "Robin, Robin, tell me what you 
mean! There isn't anyone here. Once or twice I thought I had seen - something, 
by moonlight, only it was a dream. Please, Robin - please - "
"If it's only a dream, why are you frightened?" Robin asked, through a curious 
constriction in his throat. "If they've never hurt you ..."
No, they had never hurt her. Even if, in her long - ago dream, one of them had 
come to her. And the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair - 
a scrap of memory from a vanished life on an­other world sang in Helen's 
thoughts. She looked up at the pale, impatient face of her son, and swallowed 
hard.
Her voice was husky when she spoke. "Did I ever tell you about rationalization - 
when you want some­thing to be true so much that you can make it sound right to 
yourself?"
"Couldn't that also happen to something you wanted not to be true?" Robin 
retorted with a mutinous curl of his mouth.
Helen would not let go his arm. She begged, "Robin, no, you'll only waste your 
life and break your heart looking for something that doesn't exist."
The boy looked down into her shaken face, and suddenly a new emotion welled up 
in him and he dropped to his knees beside her and buried his face against her 
breast. He whispered, "Helen, I'll never leave you, I'll never do anything you 
don't want me to do, I don't want anyone but you."
And for the first time in many years, Helen broke into wild and uncontrollable 
crying, without knowing why she wept.
Robin did not speak again of his quest in the forest. For many months he was 
quiet and subdued, staying near the clearing, hovering near Helen for days at a 
time, then disappearing into the forest at dusk. He heard the winds numbly, deaf 
to their promise and their call.
Helen too was quiet and withdrawn, feeling Robin's alienation through his 
submissive mood. She found herself speaking to him sharply for being always 
un­derfoot; yet, on the rare days when he vanished into the forest and did not 
return until after sunset, she felt a restless unease that set her wandering the 
paths herself, not following him, but simply uneasy unless she knew he was 
within call.
Once, in the shadows just before sunset, she thought she saw a man moving 
through the trees, and for an instant, as he turned toward her, she saw that he 
was naked. She had seen him only for a second or two, and after he had slipped 
between the shadows again common sense told her it was Robin. She was vaguely 
shocked and annoyed; she firmly intended to speak to him, perhaps to scold him 
for running about naked and slipping away like that; then, in a sort of remote 
embarrassment, she forbore to mention it. But after that, she kept out of the 
forest.
Robin had been vaguely aware of her surveillance and knew when it ceased. But he 
did not give up his own pointless rambles, although even to himself he no longer 
spoke of searching, or of any dreamlike inhabi­tants of the woods. At tunes it 
still seemed that some shadow concealed a half - seen form, and the distant 
murmur grew into a voice that mocked him; a white arm, the shadow of a face, 
until he lifted his head and stared straight at it.
One evening toward twilight he saw a sudden shim­mer in the trees, and he stood, 
fixedly, as the stray glint resolved itself first into a white face with 
shad­owy eyes, then into a translucent flicker of bare arms, and then into the 
form of a woman, arrested for an instant with her hand on the bole of a tree. In 
the shadowy spot, filled only with the last ray of a cloudy sunset, she was very 
clear; not cloudy or unreal, but so distinct that he could see even a small 
smudge, or bramble scratch on her shoulder, and a fallen leaf tangled in her 
colorless hair. Robin, paralyzed, watched her pause, and turn, and smile, and 
then she melted into the shadows.
He stood with his heart pounding for a second after she had gone; then whirled, 
bursting with the excite­ment of his discovery, and ran down the path toward 
home. Suddenly he stopped short, the world tilting and reeling, and fell on his 
face in a bed of dry leaves.
He was still ignorant of the nature of the emotion in him. He felt only 
intolerable misery and the conviction that he must never, never speak to Helen 
of what he had seen or felt.
He lay there, his burning face pressed into the leaves, unaware of the rising 
wind, the little flurry of blown leaves, the growing darkness and distant 
thunder. At last an icy spatter of rain aroused him, and cold, numbed, he made 
his way slowly homeward. Over his head the boughs creaked woodenly, and Robin, 
under the driving whips of the rain, felt their tumult only echoed his own 
voiceless agony.
He was drenched by the time he pushed the door of the shack open and stumbled 
blindly toward the fire, only hoping that Helen would be sleeping. But she 
started up from beside the hearth they had built to­gether last summer.
"Robin?"
Deathly weary, the boy snapped, "Who else would it be?"
Helen didn't answer. She came to him, a small swift - moving figure in the 
firelight, and drew him into the warmth. She said, almost humbly, "I was afraid 
-  the storm - Robin, you're all wet, come to the fire and dry out."
Robin yielded, his twitching nerves partly soothed by her voice. How tiny Helen 
is, he thought, and I can remember that she used to carry me around on one arm; 
now she hardly comes to my shoulder. She brought him food and he ate wolfishly, 
listening to the steady pouring rain, uncomfortable under Helen's watching eyes. 
Before his own eyes there was the clear memory of the woman in the wood, and so 
vivid was Robin's imagination, heightened by loneliness and undiluted by any 
random impressions, that it seemed to him Helen must see her too. And when she 
came to stand beside him, the picture grew so keen in his thoughts that he 
actually pulled himself free of her.
The next day dawned gray and still, beaten with long needles of rain. They 
stayed indoors by the smol­dering fire; Robin, half sick and feverish from his 
drenching, sprawled by the hearth too indolent to move, watching Helen's comings 
and goings about the room; not realizing why the sight of her slight, quick form 
against the gray fight filled him with such pain and melancholy.
The storm lasted four days. Helen exhausted her household tasks and sat 
restlessly thumbing through the few books she knew by heart - they had allowed 
her to remove all her personal possessions, all the things she had chosen on a 
forgotten and faraway Earth for a ten - year star cruise. For the first time in 
years, Helen was thinking again of the life, the civiliza­tion she had thrown 
away, for Robin who had been a pink scrap in the circle of her arm and now lay 
sullen on the hearth, not speaking, aimlessly whittling a stick with a knife 
(found discarded in a heap of rubbish from the Starholm) which was his dearest 
possession. Helen felt slow horror closing in on her. What world, what heritage 
did I give him, in my madness? This world has driven us both insane. Robin and I 
are both a little mad, by Earth's standard's. And when I die, and I will die 
first, what then? At that moment Helen would have given her life to believe in 
his old dream of strange people in the wood.
She flung her book restlessly away, and Robin, as if waiting for that signal, 
sat upright and said almost eagerly, "Helen - "
Grateful that he had broken the silence of days, she gave him an encouraging 
smile.
"I've been reading your books," he began diffi­dently, "and I read about the sun 
you came from. It's different from this one. Suppose - suppose there were 
actually a kind of people here, and something in this light, or in your eyes, 
made them invisible to you."
Helen said, "Have you been seeing them again?"
He flinched at her ironical tone, and she asked, somewhat more gently, "It's a 
theory, Robin, but it wouldn't explain, then, why you see them."
"Maybe I'm - more used to this light," he said gropingly. "And anyway, you said 
you thought you'd seen them and thought it was only a dream."
Halfway between exasperation and a deep pity, Helen found herself arguing, "If 
these other people of yours really exist, why haven't they made themselves known 
in sixteen years?
The eagerness with which he answered was almost frightening. "I think they only 
come out at night, they're what your book calls a primitive civilization." He 
spoke the words he had read, but never heard, with an odd hesitation. "They're 
not really a civiliza­tion at all, I think, they're like - part of the woods."
"A forest people," Helen mused, impressed in spite of herself, "and nocturnal. 
It's always moonlight or dusky when you see them - "
"Then you do believe me - oh, Helen," Robin cried, and suddenly found himself 
pouring out the story of what he had seen, in incoherent words, concluding, "and 
by daylight I can hear them, but I can't see them. Helen, Helen, you have to 
believe it now, you'll have to let me try to find them and learn to talk to them 
..."
Helen listened with a sinking heart. She knew they should not discuss it now, 
when five days of enforced housebound proximity had set their nerves and tempers 
on edge, but some unknown tension hurled her words at Robin. "You saw a woman, 
and I - a man. These things are only dreams. Do I have to explain more to you?"
Robin flung his knife sullenly aside. "You're so blind, so stubborn."
"I think you are feverish again." Helen rose to go.
He said wrathfully, "You treat me like a child!"
"Because you act like one, with your fairy tales of women in the wind."
Suddenly Robin's agony overflowed and he caught at her, holding her around the 
knees, clinging to her as he had not done since he was a small child, his words 
stumbling and rushing over one another.
"Helen, Helen darling, don't be angry with me," he begged, and caught her in a 
blind embrace that pulled her off her feet. She had never guessed how strong he 
was; but he seemed very like a little boy, and she hugged him quickly as he 
began to cover her face with childish kisses.
"Don't cry, Robin, my baby, it's all right," she murmured, kneeling close to 
him. Gradually the wild - ness of his passionate crying abated; she touched his 
forehead with her cheek to see if it was heated with fever, and he reached up 
and held her there. Helen let him lie against her shoulder, feeling that perhaps 
after the violence of his outburst he would fall asleep, and she was half - 
asleep herself when a sudden shock of realization darted through her; quickly 
she tried to free herself from Robin's entangling arms.
"Robin, let me go."
He clung to her, not understanding. "Don't let go of me, Helen. Darling, stay 
here beside me," he begged, and pressed a kiss into her throat.
Helen, her blood icing over, realized that unless she freed herself very quickly 
now, she would be fighting against a strong, aroused young man not clearly aware 
of what he was doing. She took refuge in the sharp maternal note of ten years 
ago, almost vanished in the closer, more equal companionship of the time 
be­tween: "No, Robin. Stop it at once, do you hear?"
Automatically he let her go, and she rolled quickly away, out of his reach, and 
got to her feet. Robin, too intelligent to be unaware of her anger and too naive 
to know its cause, suddenly dropped his head and wept, wholly unstrung. "Why are 
you angry?" he blurted out. "I was only loving you."
And at the phrase of the five - year - old child, Helen felt her throat would 
burst with its ache. She managed to choke out, "I'm not angry, Robin - we'll 
talk about this later, I promise," and then, her own control van­ishing, turned 
and fled precipitately into the pouring rain.
She plunged through the familiar woods for a long time, in a daze of unthinking 
misery. She did not even fully realize that she was sobbing and muttering aloud, 
"No, no, no, no!"
She must have wandered for several hours. The rain had stopped and the darkness 
was lifting before she began to grow calmer and to think more clearly.
She had been blind not to foresee this day when Robin was a child; only if her 
child had been a daughter could it have been avoided. Or - she was shocked at 
the hys­terical sound of her own laughter - if Colin had stayed and they had 
raised a family like Adam and Eve!
But what now? Robin was sixteen; she was not yet forty. Helen caught at 
vanishing memories of society; taboos so deeply rooted that for Helen they were 
instinctual and impregnable. Yet for Robin nothing existed except this little 
patch of forest and Helen herself - the only person in his world, more 
specifi­cally at the moment the only woman in his world. So much, she thought 
bitterly, for instinct. But have I the right to begin this all over again? 
Worse; have I the right to deny its existence and, when I die, leave Robin 
alone?
She had stumbled and paused for breath, realizing that she had wandered in 
circles and that she was at a familiar point on the riverbank which she had 
avoided for sixteen years. On the heels of this realization she became aware 
that for only the second time in mem­ory, the winds were wholly stilled.
Her eyes, swollen with crying, ached as she tried to pierce the gloom of the 
mist, lilac - tinted with the approaching sunrise, which hung around the water. 
Through the dispersing mist she made out, dimly, the form of a man.
He was tall, and his pale skin shone with misty white colors. Helen sat frozen, 
her mouth open, and for the space of several seconds he looked down at her 
without moving. His eyes, dark splashes in the pale face, had an air of infinite 
sadness and compassion, and she thought his lips moved in speech, but she heard 
only a win familiar rustle of wind.
Behind him, mere flickers, she seemed to make out the ghosts of other faces, 
tips of fingers of invisible hands, eyes, the outline of a woman's breast, the 
curve of a child's foot. For a minute, in Helen's weary numbed state, all her 
defenses went down and she thought: Then I'm not mad and it wasn't a dream and 
Robin isn't Reynolds' son at all. His father was Ms - one of these - and they've 
been watching me and Robin, Robin has seen them, he doesn't know he's one of 
them, but they know. They know and I've kept Robin from them all these sixteen 
years.
The man took two steps toward her, the translucent body shifting to a dozen 
colors before her blurred eyes. His face had a curious familiarity - familiarity 
-  and in a sudden spasm of terror Helen thought, "I'm going mad, it's Robin, 
its Robin!"
His hand was actually outstretched to touch her when her scream cut icy lashes 
through the forest, stirring wild echoes in the wind - voices, and she whirled 
and ran blindly toward the treacherous, crumbling bank. Behind her came steps, a 
voice, a cry - Robin, the strange dryad - man, she could not guess. The horror 
of incest, the son the father the lover suddenly melting into one, overwhelmed 
her reeling brain and she fled insanely to the brink. She felt a masculine hand 
actu­ally gripping her shoulder, she might have been pulled back even then, but 
she twisted free blindly, shrieking, "No, Robin, no, no - " and flung herself 
down the steep bank, to slip and hurl downward and whirl around in -  the raging 
current to spinning oblivion and death . . .
Many years later, Merrihew, grown old in the Space Service, falsified a log 
entry to send his ship for a little while into the orbit of the tiny green 
planet he had named Robin's World. The old buildings had fallen into rotted 
timbers, and Merrihew quartered the little world for two months from pole to 
pole but found nothing. Nothing but shadows and whispers and the unending voices 
of the wind. Finally, he lifted his ship and went away.
(1959)
 
The Wild One
 
This is a story that they tell on the solitary farms on the borders of the 
Catskill mountains, where I grew up. It is a mistake to think that country is 
settled and modern, just because the big highways stretch from city to city, and 
the factories hold out clean jobs that pay better than the scratch - the - soil 
farming on shale rock. For between every farm is a stretch of woodland, and 
every farm has its own woods, and by night there are deer and rabbits and even 
wolves and the big lynxes that prowl south of Canada in a hungry season. And 
every now and again, to some lonely farm - girl who roams the edges and center 
of the deep woods by night, a child will be bom like Helma Lassiter . . .
Roger Lassiter lifted his hands abruptly from the keys of die piano, and stared 
across the room at his sobbing young wife.
"Helma, dear!" he said contritely, "If I'd known - I didn't hear you come in, 
dear. Please forgive me?"
"Of course!" Helma wiped away her tears, and her strange, hesitant smile 
flickered for an instant on the wet face, "If I'd known you wanted to play, I 
wouldn't have come back so early." She crossed the room, and Roger held out his 
arms to stop her as she passed and hold her, for a moment, close to him. "Did 
you and Nell Connor have a good time?"
She dropped her eyes. "I didn't go to see Nell, Roger, it was too lovely hi the 
woods. And - and there'll be a full moon tonight. ..."
He slid his arm around the girl's waist. "You're the wildest child of nature I 
ever knew," he murmured, halfway between exasperation and indulgence, and from 
the piano bench he twisted to look out the window at the deep stretch of dark 
woodland, oaks and maple and birch, that surrounded their house; then he turned 
back to rest his eyes on Helma.
She was good to look at; a tawny blonde girl, slight, delicately but strongly 
made, with creamy skin and dark - gray eyes that lightened to amber or an odd 
gold - flecked green when she was angry or excited, and so incredibly supple 
that he often wondered if she had been a ballet dancer. He did not know what she 
had been; she never talked about her childhood, and he knew only that she had 
run away from a farm in the Adirondacks when she was only fourteen years old. 
She had been twenty - three when they met, a chance acquaintance, almost a pick 
- up, at the swimming pool in Albany. Roger, escorting a pair of frisky nephews, 
had been attracted, then charmed, by her unbelievable grace in the water, her 
swift clean beauty; a seal - woman of the legends could have shown herself no 
more at home in the sea. He had been shocked at the change which had come over 
her when she had run back to the dressing - rooms and reappeared in a cheap 
skirt and blouse, her hair brushed down and her legs encased in lumpy socks and 
shoes. It was as if rust had suddenly covered a bright coin. But he had not been 
able to forget the laughing, glowing nymph of the pool. And he had never 
forgotten. It had not taken him long to discover how she revived in the woods, 
in the country. After their marriage, they had built this small house at the 
edge of the forest; a necessity, not a luxury, for Helma drooped and wilted in 
an apart­ment. They had built the house with their own hands, camping in the 
woods while it rose from the founda­tions, sleeping at night in a tent; and day 
by day a visible radiance had crept over Helma until she seemed alive with an 
inner, glowing beauty. Still, on the first night they had slept in their new 
home, she had murmured *'I think I liked the tent better!" Even now, for choice, 
she slept on the open porch when she could.
He smiled now into her half - closed eyes and mur­mured what he had said many 
times, "I think you're half wood - cat, Helma!"
"Oh, I am," she returned, as always, "I am. Didn't you know?"
"And say, I used to have a dog who howled just like that when I played the 
piano. It's not what you'd call a compliment to my playing!"
She colored . . . even after four years of marriage, she was very sensitive 
about this. "I can't help it," she whispered for the hundredth time, "It hurts 
my ears so much - "
He patted her shoulder gently. "Well, never mind, honey, I try not to play when 
you're around," he told her, "but seriously, I'm beginning to wonder if you 
ought to go so far into the woods alone. Bob Connor told me he's heard wolves, 
and the other day he shot a lynx. Perhaps it's all right in broad daylight, but 
I wish you'd stay out of the woods at night, Helma."
He was not a countryman by habit; born and reared in cities, it had thrown him 
into a panic, the first time that he had waked in the night and found himself 
alone in bed. He had hunted the house through and found it empty; in a growing 
apprehension, mounting to absolute terror, he had searched the woods with a 
lantern, shouting, panicked, until he had finally found Henna, snuggled into a 
hollow of summer grass, sleep­ing, a rabbit bolting from her side as he came 
near.
After a few months he had come to take it for granted; Helma was almost 
physically incapable of staying out of the woods when they were so near, night 
or day. Sometimes Roger wondered if he had been wise to bring her so far from 
the cities and the plowed farms on the highways; she might have been unhappy, 
but she might have been less wild.
He murmured, "Perhaps if we had a child - "
He had spoken almost under his breath, but her body stiffened in the curve of 
his arm and she pulled away from him. "Roger," she murmured, "You know I can't - 
"
He said, low - voiced, "We haven't talked much about this, because it always 
makes you so unhappy. Now I think we must. How do you know you can't have 
children? Perhaps we could see Doctor demons when we go into town this Saturday. 
Perhaps - "
Helma jerked away from him furiously, taut, her head flung back, even the short 
sleek tawny hair seem­ing electric and alive, and her eyes flared green. The 
small blunt hands were flexed into claws. "I won't!" she spat at him, "I won't 
be mauled about and stared at by some doctor. ..."
"Helma! Roger's sharp voice cut through her hyste­ria; she relaxed a little, but 
went on in a low angry voice, "I've never told you much about me, have I? I know 
that. I can't have your child, such a child as I could have, you wouldn't want, 
I - " She slumped down on a corner of the divan and buried her face in her arms 
despondently. After a long time she raised her face. "Would it make you so happy 
if I had a baby, Roger?" she asked pitifully.
The man could not bear it. He stood up and went to her, seating himself on the 
divan at her side and pull­ing the blonde head down on his shoulder. "Not if you 
don't want to, Helma," he said, in a gentle voice, "Maybe you're right, maybe - 
"
Her wide eyes burned tearlessly in the twilight. "You think I'm wild, you think 
I'm a crazy woman who might be normal if I had a baby to tie me down a little 
bit. You want me to be like your friends' wives, like Nell Connor, sleep in my 
bed nights and never step out further than the chicken house!" Her voice fell 
steadily, accusing. She pushed him away from her, stood up and backed away 
toward the door, a low menace, not quite a word, in her throat. Before her green 
glare his own eyes fell. "Well, damn it, Helma," he muttered, "I'd appreciate it 
if you'd try, at least, to act like a normal adult human being! There are times 
when you're like a wild animal!"
"I am," she said huskily, and swiftly turned and went out of the room. Half 
rising, the man saw through the window the quick bound with which she crossed 
the porch and lawn, watched her bend, with that amaz­ing suppleness, and 
unfasten first one sandal, then the other. She kicked her feet free and ran 
toward the back gate; with a single lissome movement she was up and over it, and 
Roger saw the pale gold of her hair and the green - and - brown plaid of her 
house dress melt into the forest like a shadow, and there was a tight 
breathlessness in his throat as he watched her slide away and vanish in the 
leaves.
But she was back before morning, slipping silently, barefoot, through the doors, 
and sliding into bed be­side him, as noiselessly as a cat. Roger, who had not 
closed his eyes all night, felt her presence and moved toward her, but she 
shoved him away. Roger shrugged and sighed; he was used to this, too. Helma 
could be as violent and passionate as a young lioness when aroused, but she was 
curiously cold at other times, and would push or cuff him away if he touched her 
when she was not in the mood. Roger had reflected that civilized man alone, of 
all animals, is not cyclic in desire, and that Hernia's odd wildness was 
probably nothing more than a reversion to an earlier, possibly a cleaner day. 
Since in spite of occasional exasperations, Roger loved his wife devotedly, he 
respected her moods; it was as well that he did, for once, in the first year of 
their marriage - before he had learned how deep this was ingrained into Helma's 
whole nature - he had been less tolerant, and had once - only once - attempted 
to take her by force. There was still a tiny white line across his cheek where 
her wild hands had raked bone - deep. She had sobbed frenzied apologies 
afterward, but Roger had never risked it again. All women, he knew, were 
periodic to some extent; and it was true that she was altogether satisfying when 
her nature allowed her to be compliant.
In the days and weeks that followed, Helma was unusually quiet, subdued and 
docile. Summer lazed to a close; the crisp leaves of September drifted from 
helpless branches and the twanging winds of autumn played mournful threnodies in 
the deserted woods. Helma haunted the leaf - deep paths by day, but not once did 
she run off by night, and Roger Lassiter began to wonder if she was actually 
settling down. Surely it was time, after four years of marriage, that Helma 
should take on a look of sleekness and content, and for her body to soften a 
little from its hard angu­larity. She worked around the house happily - it was 
always neat and clean, but now it positively shone with soap and wax and 
polished floors, and Helma herself seemed as smooth and clean as a well - kept 
cat. Even her quick dancing walk seemed, although just as grace­ful, a trifle 
firmer and more subdued. And sometimes in the evenings when Roger returned home 
... he worked days, in a chemical factory ... he would hear Helma singing, a 
curious contralto croon, almost tone­less, but rising and falling in smooth, 
well - defined rhythmic cadences that were sweetly resonant.
She never told him, in so many words, that she was pregnant. Roger, although he 
guessed it as early as September, kept aloof from asking, thinking that per­haps 
she wanted to tell him herself, when she chose; but she never did, and finally 
he asked her only "When?"
"Early in the spring," she said, and her greeny eyes glanced, half - sorrowful, 
at his glad face. He told her gently, "You see, you were wrong, Helma. Aren't 
you happy about this?"
She did not answer, but put down her book and came to curl up on the rug at his 
feet, putting her head of thick short straight hair into his lap. He stroked it 
without speaking, and she shut her eyes, leaning against his knee. After a time 
she began the odd rough con­tralto crooning, and he smiled. "What kind of witch 
- chant is that, Helma? I never heard you sing before. I didn't know you knew 
one note from another."
"I don't," her smile was a gamin, enigmatic thing.
"I don't know, I remember hearing my mother sing like this when I was very 
small."
"What was your mother like?" he asked, and Helma laughed softly. "Like me."
"I'd like to have seen that! What was your father like?"
She shrugged. "I don't know. Perhaps - someone like you. Perhaps he was - 
different. Perhaps I never had a father, I can't remember."
Roger persisted "Did your mother never tell you?"
Helma suddenly drew her head away from her hus­band's stroking hands, looking up 
at him slantwise through her hair. "You would have called my mother mad," she 
said evenly, "She said my father was a lynx - a wildcat she called it."
Roger abruptly shivered as if a freezing wind had blown out the cozy fire. 
"Don't talk rubbish, Helma."
She shrugged. "You asked me. It's what my mother used to say. She was mad, 
madder than I am. She lived on a farm away up in the mountains, with only her 
grandfather and a little sister. She used to listen to hunters' stories about 
men and women who turned into wolves and wildcats when the moon was full, and 
ran in the woods at night. I've heard old men howl like the gray timber - wolf, 
when the moon lit up the snow like daylight, and seen them slink through the 
shadows with red eyes. ..."
"Hell! You're morbid tonight!"
"No. Why? When I was a little girl I used to run around the hunters' huts. I 
could walk along a path and a wildcat would walk along the limb of a tree right 
over me and never even snarl, and I could pick up rabbits with my bare hands. I 
still can." Her smile was frankly malicious now. "You don't believe those old 
stories, do you? Till she died, my mother used to run out in the woods every 
full moon. She said my father was a lynx, I didn't. Do you believe I'll turn 
into a wildcat some night and rip out your throat? A silver bullet isn't any 
good, you know. That's just an old wife's tale. Just an iron knife, a knife of 
cold iron will kill a turn skin animal. That's what they say. Iron, or lead. Are 
you afraid of me?" She laughed, and Roger felt his goose fleshed arms stiffen 
and crawl. "For Godsake, cut it out!" he almost shouted.
She had stiffened and pulled away.
"I'm sorry. You asked me."
Roger Lassiter dreamed that night of wandering in black leafless woods, while 
green cat - eyes, disturb­ingly like Helma's, watched him from low branches; she 
came in before dawn, her dress torn, a bloodstain on one foot, shivering with 
cold, and lay huddled in warmed blankets, sobbing, while a dismayed and 
hor­rified Roger washed her thorn - lacerated legs, forced brandy between her 
blue lips, and for the first time in their married life laid down the law.
"This damned monkey business has got to stop, Helma. I thought that now, with 
the baby coming, you'd show some sense. Now, listen. You're going to a doctor, 
today, if you have to be carried. You're going to stay in the house, nights, if 
I have to lock you in. I know women act funny when they're pregnant, but you act 
clean crazy, and it's got to stop." For the first time her tears and pleas had 
no effect on him; he spooned hot milk between her chattering teeth, and 
continued, thin - lipped, "One more trick like this - just one, Helma - and we 
move back to Albany, at least till after the baby comes. Helma, if I have to 
have you examined by a psychiatrist, maybe - " he could not, although he wanted 
to, form the threat he had in­tended. Helma suffered enough in a house. Her 
acute claustrophobia would certainly kill her in a hospital.
But the threats he had already made had been effec­tive enough to terrify Helma 
into submission. She saw the doctor, as he stipulated, and reacted quite 
nor­mally when he assured her that he believed she would have twins. As the 
winter settled in earnest, the house took on the air of tranquil peace which 
only the happily pregnant woman knows how to create around the home she has 
made. As in everything else, Helma was almost animal in this; Roger had never 
known a woman to seem so healthy, so casual. The wives of his friends fretted 
and were ungainly and unlovely and given to whims and complaints, and for the 
first time Roger could favorably compare his wife's docility with theirs.
The winter sneaked by on quiet - running feet. Snow came heavy that year, but 
the roads were kept plowed, and Roger managed to get back and forth every day. 
If Helma sometimes walked in the woods during the daytime, Roger did not know 
it, and she never left the house by night. The season was cruelly cold; now and 
then they could stand at the window and see a deer, made bold by the severity of 
the season, step out of the forest to the garden gate; and at night wolves 
howled in the darkness and now and then they heard the fierce snarl of a lynx, 
far away across the branch. Roger frowned and talked of getting a rifle, but 
Helma protested, "Wolves are cowards. They never attack anything bigger than a 
rabbit. And a lynx never both­ered anybody who wasn't pokin' around him."
In February Bob Connor shot a lynx, less than a mile from the Lassiter house, 
and brought it over his shoulder to the door, thumping gaily till they came to 
look.
"I shot this big fellow down by the rocks on your creek, Roger. Listen, I've 
been making my kids stay right in the back yard, and if I were you, I wouldn't 
go in the woods at night, or let your wife. There are a lot of these cats 
around," he continued, dumping the stiff corpse on the step to ease his 
shoulder, "And they can be nasty customers - God, Helma, what's the matter! 
Rog-lookout, " he warned, just in time for Roger to catch Helma as she slumped 
in a dead faint.
When she had been carried into the bedroom and revived, and had apologized 
shakily for being such a fool, Bob, out of earshot, had blamed himself severely.
"I'm sorry, Roger. I guess maybe the blood made her fainty - like. Nell hates 
seeing dead things. I knowed she was in the family way, too, and I ought to had 
more sense than barge in like that with an old dead wildcat!"
"I don't think that was it," Roger said, baffled, "Helma's never been squeamish 
about blood."
"She's a bit odd about wild things, though, ain't she?" Bob asked in a tone 
discreetly lowered, and Roger, distracted, confessed that she was. He watched 
Bob go down the road, feeling something like despair, realizing that Bob Connor 
would certainly add his bit to the stories - already far too prevalent - of 
Helma Lassiter's "Queerness." But he had not the heart to reprimand or question 
Helma, nor to repeat Bob Con­nor's final words, said in that tactfully - dropped 
voice, "I wouldn't let her run off into the woods thataway, Roger. I go out a 
lot, shooting these cats, and wolves -  bounty on wolves, you know. I try to be 
careful, and God! I'd hate to shoot somebody!"
After that day Helma grew even quieter, more sub­dued, losing even the spasmodic 
impulse to wander in the woods even in broad daylight. Somewhat alarmed, Roger 
found himself circuitously urging Helma into the garden, at least out of doors, 
out of the house which she now haunted, sleeping a great deal by day, but rising 
at night to prowl sleeplessly with her soft pacing movements through all the 
rooms. When Roger anxiously questioned her, she answered evasively: she was too 
tired to go far from the house, and the baby's movements in her body were most 
troublesome at night, and made her restless. She was heavy now, and her face was 
fuller, giving the wide - set cheekbones under her thick, tawny level brows a 
curiously un­fathomable, animal, enigmatic look. She spoke little, but she 
seemed happy and tranquil, apart from her restlessness. Roger believed that 
Helma was trying consciously to wean herself from her wild ways and that she was 
silently suffering the torture of claustro­phobia, for there seemed a curious 
disturbed look behind the green eyes, when she thought no one was watching her. 
Roger knew his young wife to be a strong - willed girl, and believed that she 
could disci­pline herself unsparingly.
In March came raging winds and a blizzard that swept down from the Adirondacks 
in a sort of apoca­lyptic violence, locking both Lassiters in the house for 
days. Then, overnight, the snow began to melt; the back of the winter was 
broken, the creeks overflowed with cool melting rains, and a strange moist green 
appeared through the soaked dead brownness of the grass. Crows and bluejays 
racketed in new - plowed fields, and a sweet chirping came from the trees at the 
edge of the woods. Sometimes now on the damp eve­nings, when light lingered at 
sundown, Helma would drag her distorted body to the forest gate and lean there, 
her face poignant with such longing that Roger, watching, felt a hurting pain 
and pity seeing his wild thing straining so hard at the leash of love he had 
finally girded about her heart. The gate was never locked, but Helma never 
touched her fingers to the light latch. Roger was just as well pleased, for now 
in the warm nights they often heard the snarl and spit of the big wildcats, and 
in these spring days he knew, the females would be defending their young. Nor 
did Roger fail to wonder if Helma would likewise be violent hi defence of her 
child.
He had assumed that when the time came for her confinement he would drive her to 
the hospital in Albany. She did not say that she approved this ar­rangement, but 
on the other hand, she made no pro­test, and Roger took it for granted.
One evening in late March, while they sat at supper, Helma said quietly "You 
better drive to Albany and get some coffee, Roger. I used the last for breakfast 
this morning, and there's none for tomorrow's break­fast."
Like many pliant and easygoing men, Roger was crotchety in small and unimportant 
trifles, and he scolded Helma with as much severity as he ever used to her; why 
hadn't she told him at breakfast? She just looked back at him with her closed 
and heavy face.
"You better go now, or the stores are all going to be closed before you get 
there."
She was walking around the room restlessly, now and again stopping to pick up 
some small object and examine it meticulously, handle it with a curious, 
fid­gety stroking movement of her small, rather stubby fingers, then put it 
impatiently down and resume her feline prowling, "But do you mind if I don't 
ride along? I'll stay here and go - go to bed. I'm awful tired."
Roger protested. "I don't like to leave you alone, specially at night. Suppose 
the baby started to come?"
"Well, you'll be back in an hour," Helma said reasonably.
"For heaven's sake, sit down, you'll drive me crazy, pacing like that - " Roger 
snapped at her, "Are you going to start your fool tricks again?"
"Oh, Roger, please," she started to sob, "I don't think I could stand being 
bounced around, until I have to!"
The man felt like a brute. Why, he wondered, should he get in a dither, because 
a girl in the last month of pregnancy didn't want to take a twenty - mile ride 
in an old car, over the worst roads in New York State? He shrugged and went to 
the closet for his coat.
"AH right, honey," he said tenderly. "Would you like me to get Mrs. Connor to 
come and sit with you while I'm gone?"
Helma said in a tone of intense disgust, "Look. I'm twenty - seven years old."
Roger hugged her. "Oh, all right, all right. I'll be back in an hour." He went 
to the garage to back out the car, but on another thought, ran back up the 
steps.
"Helma?"
"Yes? I thought you'd gone!"
"You sure you don't want to ride along, or come and stay to Nell Connor's place 
while I'm gone? I can pick you up on the way back."
Hernia's clear laugh raised staccato echoes in the unlighted porch. "Who's 
pregnant, you or me? Go along with you, or you'll have to drive all over town to 
find a store open!"
The muddy roads were now nearly clean of snow, and Roger made good time on the 
way to Albany. On the edge of town he found a small all - night grocery and 
decided to go in there, and turn back at once, instead of driving to the uptown 
chain - store where they usually traded. He bought the coffee and hurried out to 
the car again, forgetting his change, and only realizing when half - way home 
again that it had been a five - dollar bill.
It was already dark. Roger, his headlights sweeping a beam across the dark edges 
of the woods, pictured Helma, curled up kitten - fashion under quilts, but 
some­how the mental picture held no conviction nor com­fort, and he pressed down 
the accelerator to the floorboard. If a state trooper caught up with him, he'd 
tell the truth. His wife was pregnant and he didn't like to leave her alone 
after dark. If it came to that, he'd rather pay a fine than leave her alone any 
longer.
The house was dark. Only the reflection of his head­lights made ghosts on the 
unlighted window, and then Roger Lassiter saw that the garden gate swung open on 
its hinges, and that Helma's brown oxfords and crumpled duty socks lay in the 
mud beside the open gate.
At that sight Roger Lassiter's terror jumped up from behind the wall of 
consciousness, and caught him by the throat. One last wild hope still beat with 
the thudding of his pulse; Helma might have felt her labor imminent and run to 
Connor's - the path through the woods was shorter than the road. Like a crazy 
man he jumped into the auto and sent it careening wildly down the mud road. 
Before it had fully come to a stop before the Connor farmhouse, he flung the 
door open and pelted toward the kitchen door entrance.
Through the lighted window a Connor child saw him coming, and flung the door 
open.
"Mommy, here's Mister Lassiter!"
Nell Connor's horsy kind face peered over her child's head. "Roger, come in! 
What's wrong?"
The man stood blinking numbly in the light. "Is Helma here?"
"Helma? Why, no, Roger! I saw you drive by, ear­lier, and thought perhaps her 
time had come and you was takin' her to the hospital!"
"She's gone," Roger said numbly, "She's gone. I drove to Albany to get a pound 
of coffee, and she said she was too tired to come along. And when I come back 
she's just gone! Where's Bob?"
"He went out to hunt lynxes, he said it was full moon and the big cats would 
prowl all night - oh, my God, Roger!" Nell Connor's pleasant florid face was 
drained of color, "S'pose Helma's in the woods!" She lowered her voice, glancing 
at the children, "Bob told me last year that she run off in the woods sometimes, 
and he said he was scared to hunt. But this winter he's figured that with the 
baby coming, she'd stay right close to the house." She was reaching for a man's 
mackinaw that hung behind the stove, as she spoke. "Molly," she said to the 
oldest girl, "You put Kenneth and Edna to bed, now. Miz. Lassiter's lost in the 
woods, and I'm going to help Mister Lassiter look for her. Donny, you get a 
lantern and come along. An' Molly, after you get the kids to bed, you make up 
tots of hot coffee, mind, and you put a couple of hot - water bottles in my bed 
and put on both teakettles to boil." She explained in an undertone, "If the baby 
started to come, Helma's kind of nervous, she might get scared to death and just 
run off and get lost trying to come down here, poor thing. If she did, and the 
baby started to come, we'll bring her back here. I've had five, I reckon I could 
kind of look after her."
"You're so good - " Roger faltered.
"Oh, shucks, what's neighbors for? I s'pect Helma'd worry 'bout me, if I got 
lost." She beckoned to her oldest boy, and took the lantern from his hand.
"We'll go down the path, Donnie. You take the flashlight, and go down the back 
pasture, 'hind the barn. Keep yelling for your Dad, now. And if you find Miz. 
Lassiter, you yell like crazy and keep on holler­ing till we hear you, and then 
come back and tell Molly to come an' help you get her in the house. Hurry up, 
now."
Never afterward in his life could Roger remember anything of the next few hours 
except plodding through moonlit darkness, with the lantern bobbing dully in his 
hand and Nell Connor's staunch and confident voice growing gradually tired and 
afraid. They shouted "Hel-ma! Hel-ma! Hel-ma!" until their lips were cracked 
with cold and their throats hoarse, stopping to listen for answering shouts, and 
Mrs. Connor faltered, "I dunno how Helma could come so far, being big like she 
was!" They trembled when they heard an animal snarl in the woods; and once Nell 
Connor - steady, nerve - less Nell, a farm woman all her life, fifty years old - 
screamed aloud as she saw green eyes and ears laid flat, peering down from a low 
branch. But worse than this were the times when they heard the distant crack! of 
a rifle and knew that Bob Connor had shot. Behind Roger's burning eyes was the 
picture of Helma lying still and stiff beside the path somewhere, shot by 
accident, or, overcome by travail, lying somewhere in agony, unable to come to 
them, too far away to hear their shouts and calls, or - worse - hearing, and too 
weak to answer. Roger wandered into a dark night­mare, which suddenly dissolved 
around him as a shout sounded in his ears; his heart stopped and began 
pain­fully to beat again, for it seemed that he had heard Helma cry out - Helma, 
screaming, not far away - 
He caught at Nell's arm.
"Did you hear that?"
"I heard a catbird or something - " she said doubtfully.
"It's Helma! Oh, come on!"
"Roger!" She gripped and held him fast, "I didn't hear anything. Go easy, now. 
Hark, I heard someth­ing - steps - I think it's Bob." She raised her voice, 
shouting "Bob! Hel - ma! Helma - !"
Out of the night came the harsh snapping CRACK! of rifle fire, close at hand; 
two shots in rapid succes­sion, then a crashing in the thickets, and Bob Connor 
lumbered out of the brushwood.
"Nell! Roger! For God's sake, what's the matter! You look like - has something 
happened to Helma?"
"She's gone - "
"Christ!" said Bob Connor simply. "How long you been hunting her?"
"All night. Bob, I just heard her scream! She's back in there - " Roger gabbled 
like a madman, "I heard her, and something else - like a baby crying - "
"Easy, easy, Roger!" Bob Connor, his big face compassionate, caught his arm, "I 
shot a 'cat. A big female, just had cubs. I couldn't leave the little things to 
die without their mom, so I shot 'em, too."
"It's Helma! Helma's back in there, dying! Let me go, damn it, let me go - " He 
twisted away from Bob's restraining hands and ran toward the thicket. The 
Connors followed, breaking into a run after him, catch­ing up as he stopped over 
the body of the dead lynx.
It was a large female, not yet stiff, tawny gold in color, with strange eyes, 
and the limp newborn cubs were still wet with slime, unlicked. Roger stood a 
moment, numbly, over the big graceful still body; then slumped. Bob Connor 
stepped to put an arm about his shoulders and held him up.
"Come on, Roger. Come on, come on back to the house, you're worn out. Come on. 
Don't worry. We'll find Hernia. When we get back to the house, you have some 
coffee, and you look like you could use a shot of whisky. Come on. You're beat 
right out, man." While he talked, he was urging Roger's limp steps toward the 
path, "The minute we get to the house," he said soothingly, "I'll get right in 
the car and go get the state troopers. They'll look all over. Maybe she 
wan­dered across to one of the other farms. They'll find her, Roger. Come on."
Roger jerked up his head and looked into Bob Connor's eyes with the blank stare 
of a man who has been hit and does not know it yet.
"It's no use, Bob. Helma's dead. I know she's dead."
He dropped his head then and began to cry harshly.
Over his head, Bob and Nell Connor exchanged grave,
sympathetic glances. "He's worn right out. Come on,
Roger, Lean on me. Come on, now, fellow. . . ."
And where I grew up, they end the story there, be­cause Helma Lassiter never 
came back. All the farm folks wonder, sometimes, whatever happened to the poor 
crazy girl.
I used to ride my bike past the Lassiter house that summer and see Mister 
Lassiter just sitting on his back porch, day after day, just looking off into 
the woods. The lawn went to rack and ruin, and the rabbits used to hop right up 
into the garden where he was sitting. And my Daddy never would let me go into 
the woods looking for nuts again, unless he could go with me with a gun.
(1960)
 
Treason of the Blood
 
Every night, as darkness folded over the Castello di Speranza, the little 
Contessa, Teresa, descended to gloat over her prisoner. There were formalities 
to this visit, each stylized as the motions of some pagan priest celebrating 
some high and ancient ritual before the altar.
First she dismissed all of her servants, even the deaf - mute Rondo who obeyed 
her as a trained dog. Then, each night bruising her frail hands anew on the 
steel, she drew the bolts of her chamber and fastened the locks of earn 
casement. If some mythical observer could have hidden behind the arras he would 
have seen a strange thing; into each metal bolt, roughly and painfully scratched 
by hands unused to such labor, the sign of the cross had been inscribed.
Then she knelt for a moment before the oaken prie-dieu, clasping her fingers 
about her beads; mere habit now, for she had long ceased to pray. The mirror at 
the far end of the chamber gave back her reflection dimly, a shadow pattern in 
black and white; the black coils of her hair netted with thin lace, the close 
black of a mourning gown crossed by the clasped fingers of white hands on ivory 
beads, her face - drawn to the whiteness of bone, of alabaster-brushed with 
black silken brows.
A face made for softness and for love, but hard now and cruel, the eyes level 
with hate, the soft mouth drawn to a thin white line. A saint, transformed by 
the double lashes of grief and sworn revenge into a fiend from the pit.
Rising and laying aside her beads, the Contessa lifted the lid of a carven 
chest, and took a three - thonged whip of braided leather. At the end of each 
thong, bits of razor - steel had been fixed; the leather was blackened and the 
bits of steel dulled with a dull brownish - red stain. She touched her 
fingertips to the steel and drew them back quickly; the sharp steel had drawn 
her blood.
She shrugged, disregarding the pain. In the leather grip of the quirt, crudely 
cut by an inexpert knife, was again the sign of the cross.
There was no answering creak as she drew back the bolt of the secret panel. This 
door was kept oiled and in perfect repair. A taper held high in one hand, she 
descended the stairs as noiselessly as her own shadow, her trailing skirts 
sweeping aside fresh cobwebs and sending small spiders scurrying into the cracks 
of the stone.
The brackish smell of stagnant underground pools came up to meet her. There had 
been a time when her delicate nostrils had shuddered at this smell, but that 
time was long past. She herself hardly realized how much she had changed from 
the young girl, afraid of every shadow, her frail fingers bleeding from the 
strug­gle with the then - rusted bolt, who had first come down these steps in 
despair and terror.
She paused and sighed. "Why do I come?" she asked almost aloud, and tike an echo 
cast back from the dank depths there was a whisper and a sigh, "Come."
Two turns of the winding stair and she came into an arched corridor, lighted 
with dim moonlight filtering down long shafts built centuries ago. The 
passageway was lined with remnants of a grimmer day; the rusted bars of a pulley 
still suggesting the strappado, a criss­cross of bars like a hard couch, the 
grim green - bronze stare of an Iron Maiden. The Contessa barely gazed at these 
things which once had made her shudder; now they seemed familiar friends. She 
toyed, indeed, with a moment's thought they could be put in order before she 
turned the final twist in the passage, where a steel grating reared from stone 
floor to arched ceiling. Tak­ing the great key from the chatelaine at her belt, 
the Contessa unlocked the grating and passed through.
"Good evening, Contessa," said the man chained to the wall.
The Contessa bowed her head. "And to you a good evening, messire, she said in 
her melodious voice, whose modulation was so deep a habit that even the 
transformation of maiden to fiend could not alter it.
She surveyed the man before her; his arms encased in cuffs of iron secured to 
the wall by long chains that passed through a ringbolt there. His legs too were 
locked in anklets of steel joined by a chain. A tattered white shirt and dark - 
stained leather riding breeches were all his clothing, yet, as he bowed, his 
fair hair caught the gleam of the taper and the dancing shadow, on the stone 
wall seemed to reflect wide wings.
The woman, standing carefully beyond the furthest reach of the chain, let her 
eyes linger on the features, thin, sharp and subtly sensual. As he raised his 
head again, his eyes, blazing with some strange spark, crossed hers. He 
shuddered as if with some terrible pain.
The long look was almost like a lover's glance. Again the Contessa was shaken by 
the curious beauty of the chained man. Beauty? A strange word, yet beauty it 
was, the beauty of some restless caged eagle, beating its wings with the fierce 
despair and agony of its inhuman hunger. But his glance fell first, though when 
he spoke his voice held a lilting mockery.
"You are beautiful this evening, madonna," he said, "I regret that I may not 
kiss your hand."
A spasm of indefinable emotion seemed to convulse her face. "So," she said 
abruptly, "kiss if you will," and extended her slender fingers, bruised and 
bleed­ing, to him. It was a mocking gesture, but he seized her hand in his and 
bent low over it, touching his lips to the hand. Then, abruptly, he struggled as 
if sudden madness possessed him, his chained hands crushing over her wrist, 
bringing them up avidly to his lips.
With a single swift gesture she brought up the whip and, wrenching her other 
hand free, lashed out with a single brutal blow. He flinched momentarily and in 
that instant she was beyond his reach again, her eyes flaming.
"I had forgotten," she taunted, "it is full moon and you - hunger!"
He stood slumped in his chains, not deigning to answer her mockery. At last he 
said, quietly, "Aye, full moon again. Are not your dreams evil, madonna?"
She shuddered as if to ward off the memory, but said, "I count myself lucky if 
you can do no more harm than this - to send me evil dreams!" A spasm of disgust 
twisted her mouth. Suddenly she stepped back and caught up the whip again.
"Angelo, Count Fioresi," she cried in a ringing voice, "You have fed on your 
last victim - vampire!" She laughed aloud.
"Three months have I kept you in chains and watched your strength diminish and 
your evil hunger grow!"
Suddenly he strained wildly against the chains, but the spasm was feeble and 
soon he fell back exhausted, leaning against the wall and sagging.
"Once you could have burst those chains," she said, smiling in cruel triumph, 
"had I not carved the cross into each bracelet! Now even ordinary chains would 
hold you, I think!"
He propped himself up on his hands.
"Madonna," he said in a low voice, "my life is at your mercy; you might end it 
at your pleasure. None could blame you, if you sought my death. But why do you 
find pleasure in tormenting me?"
"Need you ask?" she cried in a high anguished voice - the last remnant of the 
young girl she had been three scant months ago. "You, who came to this castle as 
my suitor, beguiling my father by posing as the grandson of his oldest friend? 
How often he spoke of you, saying he felt, when he was in your company, that the 
friend of his youth had returned from the dead? He did not know how true he 
spoke!"
The Count shook his head.
"No," he said wearily. "If you must tell again that old sad tale, tell it truly. 
That is but old wives telling, that such as I return from death. We do not die, 
but live many times the span of mortal men, unless acci­dent cuts off our life - 
or, or, we are barred too long from our other source of life."
Her convulsed face seemed to waver in the dim light.
"Be it so then. Your old friend, my father, sickened and died, then Rico my 
brother, of a wasting sickness. Last of all Cassilda, the sister who had 
mothered me when I was left motherless, was laid in unhallowed Earth - still you 
sought to wed me."
"Madonna, you call me a fiend - "
"Can you deny it?" she cried. "Can you claim to be man, you who have touched 
neither food nor drink in these months since I brought you here?"
"I have admitted I am not a man of your sort," he said, his head bowed. "My race 
is far older than yours, Madonna, perhaps made before your own God gave dominion 
to your kind. Like some beasts, we live - when we have passed youth - only by 
the blood of living things. Till my thirtieth year, I thought myself as other 
men. Yet I did not kill your kin, Contessa. And if I had; if I had? Your eldest 
brother Stefano was slain in a duel with the lord of Monteno, yet Monteno's kin 
are honored guests here in Castello di Speranzo. I did not know." He seemed 
suddenly to writhe in pain - "I did not know, death was already in your kinfolk 
when I came here."
"You lie!" she cried out, and the lash whistled in the air as it caught the man 
across face and chest. He cried out hoarsely and the fiend smile crossed the 
girl's face.
"It gives me joy to know that you can suffer!" she cried. "Suffer as I 
suffered!"
The whiplash had drawn blood; she looked at the crimson drops with a strange 
gloating smile.
"Have a care, Lady," said Angelo, Count Fioresi, softly. "I sought the blood of 
men so that I might not die; you have come to seek it for pleasure."
She raised the whip again, then lowered it.
"Why can I not seek your death?" she cried. "Why did I not kill you then? What 
can I not rid God's sweet earth of such a thing as you?"
"And why are your dreams so evil?" he asked softly, "and why was it that once 
you loved me, Madonna? Your God has forbidden revenge to his faithful. Why could 
you not slay me, and leave me to his vengeance and hell - or to his mercy?"
She turned suddenly and fled down the passage and up the winding stairs. Her 
footsteps made crisp echoes in the night. And Angelo, Count Fioresi, man, 
mon­ster, vampire, whatever he was, dropped his face into his hands and wept.
The Contessa flung her windows wide, shivering as the night wind blew the 
dungeon stench from her gown; she would have knelt, but the words of the vampire 
burned in her heart; God has forbidden revenge.
What have I become? she asked herself, almost in wonder. She lay down in her 
great bed, but she feared to sleep, so great was the encompassing horror of the 
dreams that visited her. It was some evil spell of the vampire she held chained, 
she told herself; yet so great was the terror at the nights of full moon that 
she dared not close her eyes. She lay there recalling how she had first trapped 
the evil thing in man's form which lay now in her dungeon.
When first he came to them he had been ever at hand. She thought it was 
Cassilda's hand he sought, for her sister was both older and more beautiful; yet 
he showed to Cassilda only a curious courteous kindli­ness. It was the 
kindliness which she could not now reconcile with the horrors. When her father, 
then her brother had died, she had wept, "I am ill - fated; you cannot want me 
now." He had smiled and said, "Perhaps, when you are my wife, evil fortune will 
weary of following you."
But it seemed as if some evil spell lay on them all in those days, for there 
were deaths all through the vil­lage, as if some mysterious sickness plagued 
them. At last even Cassilda died, though the castle's priest, Fa­ther Milo, hid 
away her body from Teresa.
Angelo had come to her that day where she wept near the chapel - aye, she now, 
recalled, he had never stopped within the chapel doors here - his fair and 
beautiful face wrung with what had seemed to be honest compassion. Was it truly 
hell - black hypocrisy?
"Teresa, Teresa, I cannot bear to see you so alone!"
Now she wondered; what, indeed, would have hap­pened, had she succumbed to his 
pleas? Could he indeed have come within the chapel? Her cross - signs had held 
him fast; could he have wedded her indeed?
Would, she not, indeed, have accomplished her pur­pose by binding him fast in 
Sacrament. . . ?
Father Milo, drawn and quivering with his own ter­ror, had drawn her into the 
chapel that night, and signed her with the cross, then bidden her sit on his 
bench while he stood before her, his face taut with pain and horror. At first 
she had hardly listened to his rambling tale of strange deaths in the village, 
the marks found on the throat of her father and brother, the hint of some more 
dreadful horror surrounding Cassilda's death. Only slowly and incredulously did 
she realize what he was telling her - that these deaths were the work of a 
vampire!
"But this is only wicked superstition," she cried in protest, and he shook his 
head.
"No, it is the devil's work, done by one in league with that same devil!" Father 
Milo replied, his face drawn and white. Slowly, word by word, he had con­vinced 
her. Even then she had never more than half believed the dreadful tales he had 
told - that the Count had been seen to fly in the form of a bat from the windows 
of the old tower, that a holy woman of the village had smelled grave clothes and 
the musk of the coffin when he passed by; but when at last she believed, she had 
knelt before the priest, a passion of rage and terror surging up in her heart.
"What can be done?" and Father Milo answered slowly:
"The creature must die."
"Death alone would not serve!" she cried out in anguish, her face as white as 
her mourning veil. "I remember - I remember the night before she died, Cassilda 
came to my bedside and wept; and I - I did not know, why!"
Father Milo laid his hand on her head. "Bear what I must tell you now, with 
courage, my daughter. Cassilda died by her own hand, for fear of that same 
fate."
Teresa cried out in pain. "Then death alone cannot serve this monster! He must 
suffer - suffer as I and mine have suffered!"
"Revenge belongs to God alone," the priest re­buked. "I know not for certain, 
but I have heard that these monstrous creatures of the devil - cannot truly die, 
but live on in their coffins, rising to seek the blood of living things. 
Daughter, I must travel to Rome, and seek dispensation to deal with this - this 
thing, so that we may be rid of him forever."
"You must go tonight."
"But first we must make all secure," replied the priest, "So that he cannot harm 
you nor destroy you as he has done to your kin. Be watchful, but show no change 
in your manner, so that he will not suspect we know him for what he is. Then, 
when I return, we can destroy him and send him into true death back to his 
coffin for God in his infinite mercy to punish or pardon."
Teresa covered her face with her hands. "A thing from the grave and I had loved 
him!" she whispered. "God's mercy? I would see him burn forever in hell!"
The priest crossed himself, shaking his head sadly. "It grieves me that you 
speak such evil words," he said in rebuke. "Can you set limits on the mercy of 
God?"
"For that devil, yes!"
"Yet a great saint said once to Satan's self, daugh­ter: 'to thee also I may 
promise God's mercy, when thou prayest for it.' Think you, Teresa; the Count 
Fioresi is a valiant soldier and a gallant courtier. He has borne this devil's 
curse many years, and for him this must be true hell, cast out of God's sight. 
Can you deny that the merciful God might one day pardon him?"
"If I thought this," she cried out passionately, "then would I find a way to 
keep him ever from that pardon - to make him live and suffer as me and mine!"
The priest had answered simply, "You are over­wrought, and small wonder. Pray 
God to forgive your thoughtless words." He gave her his hand to rise. "I must go 
tonight; come now to your room, where we must make all safe."
His hands then had cut the sign of the cross into each door and window, and he 
had sprinkled them with holy water. He had left the main door for last, but as 
he turned to it Teresa felt a sudden, stifling terror. Even to save herself from 
death she could not endure to be shut in by spells, even holy spells.
"This I will seal myself with my crucifix when I am within," she said, and as 
she spoke, her plan leaped full - formed into her heart.
"Perhaps it is better so," he said thoughtfully. He drew from his robes a small 
vial. "Give him this in his wine," he said, "and God forgive us, daughter, but 
at least it will send him to the first death. When I return from Rome we will 
deal with the vampire, with stake and fire." Reverently he gave her a rosary. 
"This was blessed by a great Saint and is an heirloom of my family. It will keep 
him from rising from the dead until I come again."
He laid his hand on her head in blessing. "And mark," he added severely, "forget 
these wicked thoughts of revenge! I command you, on peril of your soul's health, 
pray for the soul of this lost sheep of God; pray for the soul of Angelo 
Fioresi."
But the words had fallen on a hard heart. She bowed her head, but cried out 
inside, "Never!"
With her own hands she prepared food and drink for the first stage of the 
priest's journey; but as she bade him farewell and his palfrey ambled away, she 
had turned away with the first cruel smile, crushing the little vial in her 
hand. "But you will not return," she murmured, "and vengeance will be mine!"
Then, turning from the door, she met the smiling eyes of Count Angelo, and 
forced herself to smile and give him her hand to kiss.
"Why has the priest left us?"
"To secure permission for our marriage," she re­plied steadily.
"Then we are alone here?" he drew her close, smil­ing. "May his journey be 
swift!"
But a curious frown had touched his forehead, and Teresa quailed and shrank from 
his kiss. "Not now!"
She lay awake that night, feeling like the chained goat staked out to draw the 
prowling mountain lion, the pale light from the open door lying across her face, 
waiting for the step and shadow, as of black wings across her door. She clasped 
the cross in terror, think­ing; it is true, then, that the vampire moves like 
cat or ghost on noiseless feet.
Slowly the shadow bent till the full lips touched her throat, then, as if she 
feigned waking, she murmured, "Angelo?"
"Love - "
"Wait," she whispered, clutching the cross in her hand, "the door is ajar."
"Surely not," he whispered, turning, but with a scurry of step she reached it, 
slammed it to, and jammed the bolt together with the crucifix. "Now," she cried, 
white as her nightgown, "let me see if you can leave as you came, Angelo, Count 
Fioresi - fiend, monster, murderer - vampire!" She rushed at him, hold­ing the 
light aloft. He whirled like a beast at the death, making a dash at the sealed 
windows, the other door, in vain.
She said hi a voice that shook, "I never more than half believed, till now. It 
seemed a monstrous lie, but true, then!"
The Count stretched his hands toward her and she raised the cross to ward him 
away, but although she had expected him to rush at her, bent on murder, he did 
not stir. "Teresa," he implored, "it is not what you think. I beg - I implore 
you, hear me before it is too late."
But in her wrath and fury she would not listen. She caught up the whip and 
rushed at him, raining blows on his face and shoulders. He cried out and with 
one swift movement wrenched the lash from her hands and cast it on the carpet.
"Have a care, lady," he said in a low, voice, "I know many things you know not. 
And I tell you, Teresa, at this moment you stand in peril more deadly than mine. 
Will you hear me - hear me but a moment, for the sake of the father who ties 
dead?"
Hear you, monster, murderer, grave - ghoul?" she cried, and a bleak smile 
crossed his face.
"The old tale that I rise from a coffin of death? No, Lady, I have never known 
death, yet. Nor do I want to die, yet. But if you kill me now, you pass into 
peril, so hear me first."
He strode toward her again, as if he would seize her and compel her to listen, 
but she snatched up the crucifix from the prie - dieu and held it before her. He 
flinched away and she gloated, "So that much super­stition is true?" He cowered, 
his lifted arm covering his face.
"True in part, Teresa; I cannot harm you while you bear that symbol of your 
faith, that sign that you are under God's protection* Yet for the last time I 
beg you - "
"Would you beguile me with words?" she cried. Crucifix in hand, she raised the 
whip and brought it down across his cowering form. He retreated a step and she 
followed, the lash rising and falling. "So you can bleed and suffer?" she cried 
in triumph.
"Even as yourself," he muttered, and slumped to his knees: Warding herself with 
the cross, Teresa wielded the lash, savoring each dull crack and the thin lines 
of blood that gradually crisscrossed his body. At last she stood gasping above 
him; he lay senseless and bloody at her feet. With wary glances, fearing his 
faint was feigned, Teresa ran to the chest and dragged the heavy chains thence. 
Her own frail fingers had scratched the cross in each bracelet with her diamond 
ring. Then she summoned Rondo, the deaf - mute, and with his help she dragged 
the Count down the long stairs and, shivering, locked the chains to the dungeon 
wall. Then, sick with horror and replete with the satisfaction of her first plan 
of revenge, she fell almost senseless on her bed.
"Throw the windows wide," die motioned to Rondo, "I am fainting!"
When he had left she slept, but her dreams were evil. She seemed to rise and 
pass like a silent wraith from the castle, and confused horrors of blood and 
dying faces wandered in her mind. She woke to dis­cover that she had walked in 
her sleep and lay half - in, half - out of the leaded casements.
Has he bewitched me? she wondered, as she fell across her bed in the growing 
daylight and slept.
She woke at dusk and descended, shuddering, into the crypt; but her fear was 
somehow soothed by seeing her enemy in chains. There she began the custom of 
descending each evening into the crypt . . .
As the days passed this began to absorb her more and more, so that she lived 
only for the moments when she came before the chained man, looked into his 
fierce eyes like a caged falcon, and when his pleas grew too disturbing, 
silenced them with the cruel lash into which she had now cut the cross so that 
he could not wrench it away.
The evil dreams still tormented her. The spell seemed to seize all the castle, 
for some of her servants fled, and others came to her with a tale of deaths in 
the village, but she brushed them aside like buzzing flies.
The maker of deaths is safely chained below, she thought; they cannot now 
ascribe them to supernatural visits, nor lay all deaths to such a cause! She was 
impatient and cruel with them, longing only for the moment when she would 
descend to gloat over her prisoner, then return to sleep the sleep of dead 
exhaustion.
The people of the village murmured because Father Milo did not return, and sent 
old women to her to beg that she should find another priest. "Would you com­mand 
me?" she shouted, pacing the floor, and when the delegation had fled, she stared 
at herself in horror in the glass; they will think I am mad!
So three moons waxed and waned, bringing little change. Then came a night when 
Angelo barely stirred when she spoke to him, but lay seemingly senseless in the 
straw and chains.
At last he opened his eyes and murmured, "Gloat your fill at my despair, 
madonna. The end comes. But I see you passing further and further into peril. 
For your own sake I beg you; end this."
"Why," she mocked, "the devil was sick, the devil a monk would be! Shall I set 
you as priest in Father Milo's chapel?"
"I am no monster of cruelty," he said, "though I cannot blame you for thinking 
me so. Yet, Teresa, I am safely chained here. Why, then, the deaths of your 
people?"
She shrugged callously. "Such folk are always dying. Am I responsible for them, 
bodies or souls?"
The chained creature gave her a curious calculating look. "Once you would not 
have spoken so. Once you were gentle and pious."
"And if I am a fiend from hell, who but yourself made me so?"
Almost he laughed. "No, no, you have guarded yourself from me, but have you not 
made yourself a fiend?"
"Silence," she shrieked. "Silence!" She brought down the whip full across his 
face, and, with a terrible cry he fell, blood breaking from his broken lips.
She let the whip fall, and knelt beside him. "He spoke truly; the end is near," 
she thought. "Here let him lie forever."
The crucifix she still wore swayed back and forth, casting a strange shadow on 
her prisoner, and a ran­dom thought touched her:
I have had my revenge. It is not too late to put aside my hate and do as Father 
Milo bid me; put an end to his sufferings and convey him to God's mercy. I need 
but strike him through the heart. He has said that he cannot rise from the dead. 
Even so I can pray for him the prayers for the dead, doing penance. Then will I, 
too, return to God's mercy. And Angelo - Angelo will pass to the dust he should 
long have been, and his soul settle for his crimes before God.
She had the strange sense that the dungeon was crowded with watching, waiting 
spirits; it was as if she stood at some crossroads waiting for a victim to be 
hanged or pardoned, and the victim was herself. She could cast aside hate, and 
seek mercy, or - 
Her lips curled in a smile of terrible cruelty. Never, never could she forego 
the pleasure she had found hi this! No, let him surfer, let him suffer forever! 
Who had need of God's forgiveness? There were many out­side God's domain!
"So it is too late," he said. She shrank back, but moving inexorably he sat up, 
gripped her roughly and burst the chains from his hands, then from his ankles.
Teresa shrieked aloud, cowering back and starting to her feet. She tripped over 
the fallen lash and fell to the stones and Angelo, rising, strode to her and 
stood over her.
"I would have saved you," he said at last. "Think, Teresa, of your evil dreams. 
Had they not begun be­fore ever I came to Castello Speranza? Long years ago, one 
of the women of the Fioresi married into the Speranza clan; and I knew that one 
at least of your kin would be - of the full blood of my folk. Had it been Rico, 
I would have taken him as esquire in my service, to guard and protect him. I - I 
would have saved you," he said almost inaudibly, "guarded you as a thing more 
precious than my life. I watched over you, kept you safe, guarded you in 
innocence of what you were, though I came too late to save your father - "
She shrieked in horror as the words filtered through her brain, but he went on 
remorselessly.
"When Rico met his death, I could bear it no longer, and in desperation, seeking 
only to guard you, I made it known to Cassilda. I - I did not know she would 
slay herself with the horror. I thought only that together we might guard you, 
till I could bring you safely to knowledge of what you were. You could have come 
to accept it - not as a thing of terror, but simply another kind of life; a 
different nature living harmlessly by its own laws. No, I did not slay your 
kin," he said. "I have lived so for two hundred years. Since the first year when 
I first learned what I was, no man has -  died from my touch; I know how to - 
take life - and harm them no more than a leech's blood - letting. I am neither 
evil nor cruel, madonna, because I live as I must."
He bent over her. She recoiled, mad with fear, and thrust the crucifix at him.
"No," he said gently, taking her shoulders hi his hands, "it will not protect 
you now."
He went on, almost sadly:
"I was reared to fear it; it was instilled into my inmost heart and brain, that 
I might never touch one who called sincerely on God's mercy. While you were 
still ignorant of what you were, Teresa, while you were sincerely pious in your 
faith, I could not pass through the symbol of your sincere belief. And the cross 
which you carved on my chains, thinking when you did so that you would protect 
others from my evil was a barrier to me. But now you have grown evil. You have 
rejected the teachings of your faith. You cannot call now upon your God for 
protection. The cross is now, to you, only an empty symbol, and it will not hold 
me."
He ripped the crucifix from her throat, gazed on it sadly and laid it aside.
"Perhaps I never had a soul," he said wearily, "but you, Teresa, cast yours 
away. You are too much mon­ster even to live among my people."
The last thing the Contessa ever saw was his face, torn with pain, descending 
into a crimson blur into which she fell like death.
Hours later villagers gathered to watch the Castello di Speranza crash down in 
flames, and none marked the quiet, scarred man who rode silently into the 
for­est, bowed as if in long agony, crouched in his saddle with grief and pain. 
He never looked back at the rising flame, but rode with head bowed over the neck 
of his horse and muttered again and again, "Teresa! Teresa! Teresa!"
 
The Day of the Butterflies
 
Diana was a city girl, had always been a city girl and liked it that way.
She came through the revolving doors at half - past - five, pulling kid gloves 
over her hands. The soft kid insulated her hands from the rough touch of wall 
and door, as her stilt heels tapping in bright rhythm insu­lated her feet from 
the hard and filthy concrete pave­ment. Her eyes burned with the smog, but to 
her senses it was fresh air, a normal sunshiny day in the city. She bought a 
paper from a street vendor without looking at him or it, and turned for the 
brisk three block walk to the subway which was her daily constitu­tional.
And then - what happened exactly? She never knew. There was a tiny queer lurch 
as if the sidewalk had shifted very slightly either this way or that, and . . .
... the sun was golden and honey warm and the green light filtered through a 
soft leaf canopy, lying like silk on her bare shoulders. Soft - scented wind 
rus­tled grass and caressed her bare feet, and suddenly she was dancing, a 
joyous ecstatic whirl of dance, in a cloud of crimson and yellow butterflies, 
circling like sparks around the tossing strands of her hair. She flung out her 
hands to trap them, pressed cold turgid grass blades underfoot, the chilly scent 
of hyacinths refreshed her nose, and as the butterflies flowed away from her 
fingertips she was . . .
. . . slipping down the first step of the subway, so violently that she turned 
her foot over hard and had to grab at the railing. A fat garlic - smelling woman 
shoved by, muttering "Whynya look whereya going?" Diana shut her eyes, opened 
them again with a sort of shud­der. The sooty light of the subway struck her 
with almost a physical pain; it's very strange, she thought with confused 
detachment, that I never realized before quite how ugly a subway staircase is, 
how grimy and dark . . . and then the jolt, delayed, hit her.
My goodness, she thought, there must be something wrong with my mind! Because I 
was there, for just a minute, dancing! I didn't just smell it, or feel it, or 
see it, I smelled it and felt it and saw it, and tasted it and walked on it and 
touched it! It was a hallucination, of course. A thought pinked her cheek with 
tingles, did I really dance here on Lexington Avenue? Automatically she thrust 
her token into the subway turnstile.
A golden butterfly fluttered from her hand.
Diana let the man behind shove her through the turnstile. She looked up, dazed, 
as the brilliant flicker of gold danced up through the noisy dismal stench and 
was gone. A tiny child squealed, "Oh, lookit the but­terfly!" but none of the 
grim faces pouring through the maw of the subway station faltered or looked up.
Diana wedged herself into the train and grabbed, dazed, at a strap. The rattle 
and jolt under her feet was acutely painful, though she had never noticed it 
before. Her toes wriggled, craving the cold of grass; she breathed, trying to 
recapture hyacinth and choked on garlic, sweaty bodies fetid with chemical 
deodor­ants, hairspray, cheap perfume and soot.
But what happened? She thought wildly that she wasn't the kind of person things 
like that ever hap­pened to! No, I dreamed it, butterfly and all, or there's 
something wrong with my eyes.
And so, as a child of the twentieth century, who never had believed anything she 
could not see, and hi these days of TV and camera dynamation and special 
effects, only about half of what she did see, she managed to close her mind 
against this incredible opening of the door.
Until the next time.
The next tune she was in the hurly burly of Perm Station, midmorning of a busy 
Saturday. Bodies pushed, shouted, stared anxiously at some destination known 
only to themselves. The public address system made cryptic noises distorted into 
improbable sounds. Diana hurried along, her gloved hands resting firmly on 
Pete's serge arm, her heels racing to keep pace with his stride. It was not that 
they were in any particular hurry, but all the surroundings screamed at them to 
hurryhurryhurry, and obediently they hurryhurried.
It was as rapid as a thought, the fading of the thick noisy air, the descent of 
silence . . . except for the gently rustling wind in the long dry grass at her 
feet. She was running, dancing in a whirl of jeweled butter­flies, tossing her 
arms in wild abandon, the play of chilly winds against her bare legs and feet. . 
.
... she was not. The air was thick and harsh in her lungs, and she literally 
gasped at the impact of noise hi the moment before she felt Pete stop in his 
tracks and watch her with a frown.
"Something the matter, Di?"
She felt like saying "Yes, everything. This horrible place, I've just realized 
just how horrible it is . . ." but she didn't. That would be to give reality, to 
give preference even to that . . . that dream or hallucina­tion or whatever it 
was. She moved her feet inside the tight shoes, sighing a little.
"No, nothing. I felt - it's a little hot and stuffy in here and I felt a little 
absent - minded."
Absent - minded is right. My body was here - or Pete would have noticed - but my 
mind went off on a leave of absence, heaven know's where my mind was. She asked, 
"Why did you ask, Pete? What did I do?"
"Well, you sort of stopped in your tracks, and I couldn't see what you were 
looking at," said Pete the practical, "and you sort of lurched a little like you 
turned your ankle. You all right?"
"Of course," she said, responding to the tenderness in his voice. Oh, she loved 
him, he wasn't just an­other date, he was the right one, the one she wanted to 
spend her life with, and yet, was anything here ever really right, after all?
No, thinking like that gave all this reality . . . that hallucination . . .
"Got something on your foot? Chewing gum, dog mess?"
"No," said Diana, scraped her foot backward and it was true. Who would see or 
believe a crushed blade of grass here in the noise of Penn Station?
"Then let's hurry and get our train," he urged.
"Is there really any hurry?" she asked in sudden rebellion, "except, maybe, to 
hurry up and get out of this ugly filthy station? Did you ever stop and think 
how ugly most of the city is?"
"Wouldn't live anywhere else," Pete said promptly, "and neither would you! Or 
are you getting homesick for the corned hills of Iowa or something like that?"
"Pete, you nut, you know I was born in Queens!" It isn't even nostalgia for some 
faraway and lovely child­hood! But what is it, then? How can I be - homesick?  - 
for something I never saw, never even dreamed? Maybe I've just had a little too 
much of a good thing. Surely the city is a good thing, everything man ever 
wanted is here, culture, progress, companionship, even beauty, and Pete. . . .
"Pete," she said, "do we have to finish this shop­ping right now?"
"No, certainly not. You're the one who was in a hurry to pick out towels and 
skillets and things and put them away for the day when we find that apartment 
and get that license. But what shall we do instead, then?"
And all too accurately she foresaw the astonishment in his face when she said, 
"Let's go walk in the park -  under the trees - and look at some flowers." But 
she knew he would say yes, and he did. It wasn't much. But it helped. A little.
And now she never knew, when she blinked her eyes, whether she would open them 
to the noise and roar of the city - or to the green and dancing world of the 
butterfly glade. In some part of herself she knew it was hallucination, 
aberration of eyes and mind, but . . . why did she, now and then, find herself 
clasping a butterfly, a flower, a blade of grass? But she did not deceive 
herself about why she put off, again and again, her promised visit to a doctor - 
or an optician - or a psychiatrist. Next time, she told herself, next time for 
sure. But she knew why it was always next time and never this.
If it's a hallucination a doctor would make it go away.
And I don't want it to go away!
She flattered herself that no one knew, and yet one day she emerged from a 
maenad dance to the sound of distant Pan pipes, her disheveled hair hot and 
sweaty on her bare neck - and then with the shock and jerk, feeling the pins 
taut in the French knot at her neck, her hands just touching the keys of her 
office Selectric, and the girl at the next desk staring.
"What's with you, Diana? I've spoken to you three times."
She raised her hands from the keyboard, unwilling to let it go this time, aware 
that she had lost the thread of the document she was copying. ". . . comprising 
that particular tract of land being the Western half of a section beginning at 
the point of intersection between the Northern line of 48th Street and the 
Eastern Line of Raymond Street, formerly called Beaver Street, as said streets 
are shown on the map and hereinafter referred to as Lots 13, 14 and 15 of ..."
What absolute, utter rubbish! she thought, cradling in her hand the cool 
softness of the tiny blue blossom, her fingers cherishing the tiny petals. She 
concealed it inside her palm from the other girl's eyes and knew that her voice 
sounded strange as she said, "I'm sorry, Jessie. A - a kind of daydream, I 
guess."
"It must have been a real doozy," Jessie said, "you looked all sort of soft and 
radiant. Who was the guy? Michael Sarrazin, or somebody? Or just Pete? If he 
turns you on that much, you're one lucky woman!"
Diana laughed softly. "If it was anybody, it would be Pete. No, I just - " she 
found the words hard to form, "I was daydreaming about a - a wood. A kind of 
grove full of flowers and butterflies."
She had expected a flippant comment from the other woman, but it did not come. 
Instead Jessie's round face took on a remembering look. "Funny. That sounds like 
what I did the other day. I went to see my Aunt Marge in Staten Island, and I 
took the ferryboat, and I thought, all of a sudden, that I was running on a 
beach picking up shells. It seemed so real. I could hear the gulls, and smell 
the salt, and I even thought there was sand under my feet bare feet, that is. 
Only the only beach I ever been to is Coney Island, you know, so it wasn't that, 
this was a beach like in the movies, you know." She laughed, embarrassed. "Funny 
thing hap­pened later."
"Yes?" Diana felt a choking lump in her throat and her upper arms prickled goose 
flesh.
"You won't believe me," Jessie said, "but when I got home, I took off my shoes - 
I always take my shoes off first thing when I get home, and - "
"Yes?"
"You won't believe it. But there was sand in my shoes."
"Sand?"
"Sand. White sand. Like it was all over my rug."
"You're right," Diana said, "I won't believe it."
If I did, what else would I have to believe?
She might have written it off as frustration - for she was very much a child of 
the Freudian age, and repres­sions and frustrations were as much a part of her 
vocabulary as computers and typewriters, but there was nothing either of 
repression or frustration in the surroundings next time, for she and Pete were 
curled up together on the big sofa in her apartment, the lights were low and the 
music soft, but Pete was quiet, abstracted; she thought for a moment he had 
dropped off to sleep, and moved ever so gently to extricate her arm, but he 
murmured, not opening his eyes, "Golly, that wood smoke smells great - " and the 
implication electrified her, so that she jerked upright as if an electric 
current had jolted them apart.
"Pete - you too?"
He sat up, with the look she knew had been so often on her own face, but to his 
murmured disclaimer she charged, "Where were you this time? Pete, it's hap­pened 
to me too, only with me it's a wood, a wood with butterflies and grass . . . 
Pete, what's happening to people? I thought it was only me, but a girl in my 
office . . . and now you . . ."
"Here, here, hold on!" His hands seized, calmed her. "But it's happened to me - 
oh, maybe a dozen times; suddenly I'm somewhere else, I know it's a dream, but 
it smells so damned real . . ." He looked thoughtful. "What's real anyhow? Maybe 
this is only one reality, or maybe our reality has something wrong with it. Look 
at us ... all packed together like in a hive . . . fine for bees, sure, but 
people? Is this the way a million years of Nature evolved man to live?"
Diana felt curious choked excitement; but felt com­pelled to cling to logic. 
"And you a city boy? You always said the city was the end result of man's 
prog­ress, social evolution - "
"I said too many dam fool things. Yeah, end result, all right. Dead end."
"Oh, yes," she sighed, "I hate it so now. Maybe I've always hated it and didn't 
know."
"And maybe there's nothing . . . nothing abnormal about this daydream, or 
hallucination, or whatever it is. Maybe it's just our subconscious minds warning 
us that we've had enough city, that we've got to get out if we want to stay 
sane."
"Maybe," she said, unconvinced, and shifted weight as he changed position, 
bending to retrieve what fell from his lap.
It was a tiny brown - scented pinecone, no longer than her thumbnail. She held 
it out to him, her throat tight with excitement.
"Pete - what's real?
Pete turned the small cone tenderly between his fingers. He said at last, 
"Suppose - suppose experi­ences are only a form of agreements? Even the 
scien­tists are saying, now, that space and matter, and above all, time, are not 
what the material physicists have always thought. Did you ever hear that all the 
solid matter in a planet the size of our Earth could be compressed into a sphere 
the size of a tennis ball -  that all the rest of it is the space between the 
atoms and the electrons and their nuclei? Maybe we only see the material 
universe this way - " he gestured at the room around them, "because this is the 
way we learned to see it. And now humanity is so overcrowded and our senses so 
bombarded with stimuli that the - the texture of the agreements is breaking 
down, and those little spaces between the electrons are changing to conform to a 
new set of agreements? So that we find that ice isn't necessarily cold, and fire 
doesn't necessarily burn, and the chemical elements of smog might be butterflies 
in the oxygen - "
"But what would make that set of - of agreements break down, Pete?"
"God knows," he said slowly, and she knew he was not swearing. "Sensory 
deprivation can drive a man's sense receptors to pick up very funny things - 
five hours in a deprivation tank, they found out, was the most a man could take 
without going raving mad. Maybe sensory overload could do the same thing. Maybe 
- "
But she did not hear the rest, for the world dis­solved in a green swirl, and 
she ran, dancing, through the green glade. Only this time Pete was there, too 
...
From that day she began to look for signs. Her boss paused at her desk to ask 
for a legal document she was typing, but before Diana could pull it out of her 
type­writer he cocked his head to one side and she heard, briefly, the 
twittering of a distant bird, and he shiv­ered a little, snapped, "I'll talk to 
you later about it," and she saw him, dazedly, heading downstairs for a drink. 
In a sudden rainstorm she managed to be first in the crush for a taxi - and a 
soft, curling green oak leaf lay on the seat.
Is it happening everywhere, then? And does every­body it happens to, think he or 
she is the only one?
She found herself scanning newspapers for strange happenings, felt a curiously 
confirmatory thrill the night a news correspondent, straight from wherever the 
"front" was this year, came on the air, sounding dazed, with a story he tried to 
refer to, flippantly, as "the gremlins getting out of hand again." It seemed 
that eight Army tanks had vanished without trace, before the eyes of an entire 
regiment. Sabotage was sug­gested, but then who had bothered to plant half a 
dozen beds of tulips in their place? A practical joke of enormous proportions?
But Diana was beyond surprise. Her own hands were filled with flowers she had 
gathered . . . some­where. . . .
It made the cover of Time, next week, when after a lengthy manhunt, a criminal 
serving a sentence for armed robbery was found only a mile from the prison. 
Questioned, he said, "I just got into a mood where I forgot the prison was 
there, and walked out," while the guards on the walls swore repeatedly - and lie 
detectors confirmed - that no one had gone in or out, not even the usual laundry 
truck. And the man might have rifled a supermarket - only there weren't any in 
the locality - for his arms were filled with exotic tropi­cal fruits.
All Pete said to this, when the story was shown to him, was "The fabric of this 
reality is getting thinner and thinner. I bet a day will come when every morning 
more of the cells in that prison will be empty, and they'll never find most of 
the ones who walk out. After all, their reality is a lot more unbearable than 
most."
He frowned, staring into space. She thought he had gone away again, but he only 
mused, "It's getting pretty thin. I wonder how long it will last, and where it 
will rip all the way across?"
She clung to him in terror. "Oh, Pete, I don't want to lose you! Suppose it does 
- tear all the way across -  and we lose each other, or one of us can't get 
back?"
"Hey, hey, hey!" he held her, comfortingly. "I've got a feeling that whatever it 
is between you and me, it's part of a reality that's maybe realer than this. We 
might have to find each other again, but if what we have is real, it'll last 
through whatever form reality takes." He looked somewhat abashed as he added, "I 
know it sounds corny in this day and age, but I love you, Diana, and if love 
isn't real, I don't know what is."
She was hardly surprised when, though his arms were still around her, she felt 
the cool grass beneath them, saw the green light through the trees. She 
whis­pered, against the singing winds, "Let's never go back!"
But they did.
But the fabric thinned for Diana daily. Shopping in the East Village for beads 
to back up an advertising display, she was struck by the look of blank - faced 
ecstasy, die impression of being elsewhere, on the soft preoccupied faces of 
bearded boys and long - haired barefoot girls. They can't all be on drugs, she 
thought.
This is something else. And I think I know what.
A delicate wispy girl, in a long faded dress, her hair waist length, looked up 
at Diana; and Diana was con­scious of her own elaborately twisted hair, her 
heels forced high on fashionable platforms, her legs itchingly imprisoned in 
nylon; thought wistfully of green forest light and gleaming butterflies, bare 
feet racing through the glades ... no. No. I'm here in the city, and I have to 
live with it. They seem to be living elsewhere. . . .
The hippie girl smiled gently up at Diana and gave her a flower. Diana would 
have sworn she had not been carrying flowers. She whispered, "You know, don't 
you? Do your thing while you can, if it's really your thing. It won't be long." 
And in her eyes Diana saw strange skies reflected, heard the distant roll of 
breakers and a faraway cry of gulls from . . . some­where? Jessie's beach? She 
murmured, "I know where you are."
The sound of breakers died. "Oh, no," the girl said sadly, "but you know where 
we ought to be. It won't be long now, though. They're trying to pave it all 
over, you know. Make it into one big parking lot. But it won't work. Even if 
they covered over the whole planet with concrete, one day it would just happen. 
The Great God Pan would step down off that statue in Central Park - the real one 
- and stamp his hoof down through the concrete, and then . . . then violets 
would spring up through the dead land. . . ."
Her voice trailed into silence; she smiled and wan­dered away, her bare feet 
treading the filthy pavement as if she already wandered on the prophesied 
violets. Diana wanted to run after her, into that place where she so obviously 
spent so much of her time now, but she forced her feet on her own errand. She 
and the girl were in different layers of time, almost in different layers of 
space, and only by some curious magic had they come within speaking distance; 
like passing ships drifting through fog just within hail, or two falling leaves 
just touching as they fell from separate trees. She saw the street through a 
blur of tears, and for the first time tried, deliberately, to breach the veil, 
to reach for that other world which broke through into this so unpredictably, 
and never when you wanted it. ...
Even as a city girl, Diana had never liked Wall Street. At high noon it is 
chaos, noise and robot like humans all alike and all perpetually rushing 
nowhere; a human ant hill populated by mimic creatures, in suits and ties of a 
pattern so rigid that they seem to have grown on the semi human forms. The rush 
and pandemonium assaulted her senses so violently that she stopped dead, letting 
the insect like mimics - surely they could not be human - divide their flow 
around her, as if she were a rock in their stream.
Ugliness! Noise everywhere! Horror! She thought wildly, this world is wrong, a 
huge cosmic mistake, a planetary practical joke! If everyone who knew, every­one 
who's seen the real world, would somehow just say NO to all this, would just 
reach out all together, say, This is too much, we don't, we won't, we can't 
stand . . . then maybe those ugly skyscrapers would just dissolve, violets 
spring up. ...
Oh, listen, she implored, her whole body and mind and senses all one strained 
hunger, listen! If they'd only stop and see all this the way it really is, see 
what's happening to people who think it's real and think they have to live in 
it!
Time and space are only this way because we have made them this way, and we've 
made them all wrong! Let's start all over again and do it right this time!
She never knew how long she stood there, because for her the accidents of time 
and space had stopped. She only knew that everything she was and ever had been 
had poured itself into the one, anguished, pas­sionate plea, listen! And then 
she became aware that hers was only one voice in a vast, swelling choral song. 
As perception slowly came back to her overloaded senses, she saw first one, then 
another and another of the rigidly suited forms stop, fling away umbrella and 
briefcase, then split like an insect shedding his chitinous shell and burst into 
humanity again. The veil of illusion shredded from top to bottom; skyscrapers 
thinned to transparency, melted and vanished, and the great, towering, real 
trees could be seen through their wavering outlines. Through the dead and 
splitting con­crete, a shy blade of grass poked up its head, wavered slightly, 
then erupted in a joyous not of green, swiftly blotting out the concrete.
Great green lawns expanded from horizon to hori­zon, as the sky quickly cleared 
to a delicious blue.
Silence descended, threaded with tracery of birdsong; one lonely, bewildered 
taxi horn lingered, questioning, and frantic, before it died away forever; in 
the can­yons of Manhattan, the real Manhattan breaking through, men and women 
ran naked on the grass, flowers in their hands and garlands in their hair, as 
the jeweled butterflies flashed upward, flaming and gleam­ing in the sun.
Diana, sobbing with joy, ran into the throng; know­ing that Pete was there 
somewhere, and Jessie, and the hippie girl, and children and prisoners and 
every­one for whom illusion had vanished. She ran on, shed­ding butterflies at 
every step, and wondered, once and never again, if the other world, the one that 
wasn't real, was still there for anybody. But she didn't really care ... it 
wasn't there for her anymore, and Pete was waiting for her here. She knew she 
would find him, and of course she did.
(1976)
 
Hero's Moon
 
"That could be him now," Feniston said.
Young Rawlins bent to examine the whirling flickers on the radar screen, trying 
to distinguish any clear pattern in the "snow" and chaos of interference. 
"Yeah," he said at last, "or it could be another sun - spot. I'm betting on the 
sunspot."
It was so quiet in the bubble - dome that the scrape of their shoes on the 
floor, the very brush of Feniston's starched tunic against his chair, sounded 
loud. That; and the soft mechanical beeping, burping, clicking, rattling and 
plinking of instruments; the background rattle and sputter of static from the 
screens and relays. But they lived with that, and they never heard it. Only some 
abrupt change, or the cessation of those mechan­ical tickings and pipings, would 
have been audible to them. They would have heard it instantly if one of those 
ticks, tocks, peeps, beeps or clucks had not sounded at its appointed split 
second. But not while each one sounded in its mechanical perfection.
Feniston was a neat straight man of fifty, his whole personality as combed and 
brushed and starched as his uniform, but the starch was beginning to show a 
pat­tern of thin fine cracks from tension and weariness. He didn't answer 
Rawlins, watching the younger man with an odd sense of detachment, as if neither 
of them were quite real any more. Psych Section would tell me it's just fatigue. 
I'm not so sure.
The events of the last few days, it seemed to Feniston, had worn a little of the 
new off the Rawlins kid. Rawlins still had his Earthside tan, and nothing could 
affect the bounce in his step, but he moved with a kind of hesitation that had 
never been there before, and there was something new in his eyes. Not fear, not 
yet. But something.
And above their heads was a narrow, smoked - glass horizon, and outside all hell 
was raging.
There is no air on Charmides, and therefore no rain, no wind, no thunder. From 
time to time a small vibration beat up through the soles of their shoes, or 
there would be the tiniest possible brightening of the light in the dome. 
Otherwise, only the insane racing and flickering of their dials and screens, the 
epileptic jerking of the indicators, back and forth without any pattern, told 
them that there was a wild hell of electric storm raging outside. The fierce 
glare and the eternal, unstirring dust were unchanged. Earthmen think of storms 
in terms of roaring wind, noise, visual and sonic battering. So it's hard to 
think of it as a storm. But there's nothing else to call it. And that quiet hell 
outside had damped out the fragile electrical impulses which held relays 
together and had turned the bubble - dome, which was Relay Station Twelve, into 
a private universe no wider than a tomb.
And it is a tomb. . . .
There was a third man in the tomb, but he didn't count. Dead men don't, and 
Rubichek was very, very dead indeed. He was draped with a sheet because he 
hadn't been much to look at even when he was alive; and after a four - hundred - 
pound rock had smashed down on his spacesuit, he was a lot less to look at. Even 
though he hadn't been alive when the rock smashed on him. He'd been fried alive 
first, when the insulation failed in his storm suit.
Feniston turned his back on the draped and sheeted form and began to walk around 
the dome, pausing to make brief notations on a clipboard in his hand. Rawlins 
watched him with barely concealed rage, as he patiently worked his way around 
the perimeter, and finally exploded.
"Reading  -  on  -  this  -  instrument  -  made  -  impossible  -  by 
electrical  -  interference. Reading  -  on  -  this  - instrument  -  made  -  
impossible  -  by  -  electrical - good God, sir, how many times in the last 
three days have you written that all down word for word? How many times have you 
made me write it all down, every twenty minutes? Every instrument, day or night, 
every twenty minutes - damn it, Feniston, why!
"Rule book," Feniston said, knowing it would trig­ger an outburst, and it did. 
Rawlins swung around and told him in a loud voice what he could do with his 
censored, deleted and otherwise qualified rule book. Feniston listened, 
concealing a dismayed amusement at the kid's command of obscenities. They've got 
some new expressions Earthside. I always thought cussing was unoriginal. Rawlins 
finished by demanding: "Isn't there any paragraph something, section umpty - 
ump, rule whatsit, that tells you what to do with a dead man when you can't even 
get through to report his corpse?"
"As a matter of fact," Feniston said, putting the clipboard back into its 
cubbyhole, "there is. Section Nine - four Alpha. You preserve said corpse with 
all due attention to decency and the religious preferences of deceased as far as 
said preferences are known to you, unless such preservation shall endanger 
health, safety or morale, in which case the senior officer pres­ent shall at his 
personal discretion bury, burn or other­wise dispose of said corpse without 
further - "
"Oh, damnation!" shouted Rawlins, "you've got an answer for everything, every 
goddamn thing, and all the time Rubichek lying dead, just because of you and 
your forever - be - damned rule book - "
Feniston sighed, picked up pen and clipboard and returned to the meaningless 
task of checking his in­struments. He thought, poor Rubichek, but it was an 
impersonal sadness. Neither of them had known the dead man more than a few 
hours; when the storm broke he'd been outside, servicing the air mechanism on 
his regular monthly rounds. Feniston was a little worried about the air system. 
Rubichek hadn't fin­ished the servicing when he ran into trouble. And there were 
all those other Relay Stations he hadn't gotten to yet this month. He'll never 
get to them, now. Poor Rubichek.
And poor Rawlins. Poor Tommy. Like all the other bright - eyed kids, when they 
first got to the Alpha Centaurus system, all full of big - eyed wonder about 
their life - time dream, and to run into something like this, his first 
assignment.
And the kid had been so excited, under a veneer of grown - up calm, about his 
first station in the Service. Feniston's bleak, disciplined face went gentle. 
Like Mike. Feniston and his son had discussed their plans, on his last furlough, 
two years ago. Mike had already wanted the Space Service himself. But his eyes 
weren't quite good enough. Good enough had to be just a little better than 
perfect, and Mike's eyes weren't, not quite. So he followed the old man into 
Comm Section. And he's coming out this month on the Astraea. He won't be the 
first of the second - generation men in the Service. Not quite. But there aren't 
so many, at that.
He let Rawlins pace the floor, though it got on his nerves. There's a time to be 
tough with kids, and a time to let them think they're getting away with 
something. Rawlins' outburst hadn't been exactly the way for. a first - year man 
to talk to his senior, and discipline in the Section was not quite military, but 
close enough; on a planet like Charmides it had to be. So most of the time when 
Rawlins did it, Feniston slapped him down hard, the way he'd have done with Mike 
when his son was younger. But today, knowing that in some inde­finable way the 
outburst had done them both good, he let Rawlins pace and snort for a while, 
then called a halt to it as naturally as he could.
"It's getting pretty bright in here. Want to adjust the darkeners?"
Rawlins went to manipulate the controls that ad­justed the thickness and 
darkness of the opaque fluid between the two layers of the bubble - dome, 
shutting out the glare of midday. At the height of noon which lasted for 
thirteen and a half hours, Earth reckoning the smoked glass and dark fluid would 
be reinforced by steel louvers, encasing the dome like an insect's carapace.
He's still mad. But not too mad to do what he's told. He knows my report this 
time will make or break him in Comm. So he's learning - slow, but he's learning 
- to keep his temper. And that's as it should be. You can't make it in the 
Section without control. Whether it makes sense by Earth standards or not.
"It's mealtime, Tom, but I want to get on the panel - it might clear for a 
minute, and I might be able to patch a message around by Seventeen and Four. 
Want to fix us something? Let's have some of the chocolate for a change, and 
break out some of that canned jam." It was a time, he knew, for small, morale - 
building luxuries. "I'm sick of that instant lye the Rations Board calls 
coffee."
Rawlins grinned. "You mean to tell me that after thirty years you can still tell 
what ration coffee tastes like?"
Later he took the panel so that Feniston could eat. The older man noticed that 
his face changed when he straddled the monitor bench, became grave, intent, 
responsible. The older man, spooning peach jam on a biscuit, watched him with 
genuine affection. He'll make a good relay man, someday.
"I'll eat as fast as I can, Tom, and get back on the board."
"Take your time," Rawlins did not take his eyes off the monitor. "No sense 
getting ulcers; you're hard enough to live with, as it is."
Feniston chuckled. "Hardly have time to get an ulcer now."
"Will you be sorry to retire, sir? Get back Earthside?"
"How do I know, yet? Thirty years is a long time."
"You ought to have had a comfortable desk job, ten years ago, sir. Earthside, or 
at least Port Major."
Feniston set his cup down with a bang. "You think that's what I wanted? Sure, I 
could have had a desk job, or retired five years ago with full pension, but 
they're still short of qualified men, and they were glad I didn't start 
squawking to retire. And I went into debt to get Mike into technical school so 
he'd be ready for the Service." His thoughts ran a familiar channel. "I'll 
retire when he can come out and replace me. You know it's this month - "
"You told me," Rawlins reminded him, laughing, "half a dozen times. I'll be glad 
when that son of yours does get here."
Feniston laughed with him and spooned up the last of the jam. "I'll take the 
board now; you'd better get some sleep before it's time to go on shift again."
Rawlins had slept and returned, and the darkeners had been twice adjusted 
against the brightening day, when Rawlins at the monitor roused Feniston from a 
brief doze on the lounge in the dome.
"I think this is really it. Come and see, sir."
Feniston came barefoot across the cold tiles and blinked at the screen. 
"Something out there, yes," he said at last. "Try it on visual."
Rawlins turned the knobs; blurred geometrical pat­terns chased one another 
across the TV monitor and cleared for a second into the litter of dust, rubble 
and rocks that was Outside. Then it dissolved into racing waveforms. - 
"Can't tell anything from that."
"But I know I picked up something that doesn't belong there," Rawlins argued, 
"just this side of that pointed rock you always use for your sightings. Watch 
when it clears." They bent side by side in front of the screen, Rawlins fiddling 
with dials; then the TV screen cleared for an instant. It dissolved three 
seconds later, but Feniston's trained eyes had seen.
"Looks like a Twelve Bug, Tom."
Rawlins let out an explosive sigh. "Thank God!"
"So glad to have company? Even a Special Agent come trouble - shooting?"
"Sir, after the last few watches, with Rubiehek there, I'd be glad to see a cop 
come to arrest me for his murder." Rawlins bit off the word and looked away from 
Feniston. "When will he get here?"
"No telling, in that thing." The Twelve Bug - Surface Individual Transit, Model 
Twelve - B in the Service manuals - was little more than a spacesuit equipped 
with caterpillar treads and a motor; they crawled along, powered by cheap 
unprocessed crudes, residues from the mines all over the planet. "In good 
weather, twenty minutes."
But it was two hours before the little bubble - shaped vehicle crawled into the 
airlock and signaled. Since the lights downstairs were not working - the 
emergency generator covered only the minimum services with­out which no human 
could survive an instant on Charmides - Feniston went down with a hand lamp. 
Through the thick glass of the decompression cham­ber, Feniston saw a tentacled 
monster emerge from the Twelve Bug and move toward the door. Heavy, 
overbalanced, it raised one arm, encased in the tool - tipped pressure gloves, 
to unfasten clamps and grommets; then a reassuringly human head emerged from the 
monster, a head with close - clipped graying hair, features lined by years of 
hard living, hard thinking, hard discipline. He handed the huge Dayside helmet 
to Rawlins, who had come down the hatch after Feniston.
"Jesus, what a trip!" He shook his head inside the collar of the suit, easing 
cramped muscles. "Lucky I had my Dayside helmet in the Bug, or my eyes would 
have been fried. When I started, I expected to get here before Centaurus was 
over the horizon. It's hell out there, did you know?"
"Glad you're safe, sir," Feniston said curtly. "My name is Feniston, senior in 
Relay Twelve Station - "
"Look, let me get the hell out of this straight jacket before you start spouting 
the formalities, do you mind?"
"As you wish," Feniston said stiffly. "Rawlins will help you out of your suit. 
One of us should be on the panel." He disappeared up the metal stairway; the 
stranger raised his eyes, but didn't comment. A chip still on his shoulder, 
Rawlins demanded, "What pos­sessed you to leave Port Major on a day like this, 
sir?"
The man gave him a single clinical glance. "I didn't. I left before the storm 
hit Port Major."
"But - good God, sir, that means you've been sev­enty hours and a bit, on a five 
- hour run!"
"Right. And a Twelve Bug feels like a coffin from the inside. I'd appreciate a 
basin of water, a soft place to sit down, and something to eat beside Basic Nute 
pills."
Rawlins helped ease the man out of his spacesuit. "Make yourself at home, sir. 
My quarters are right through there. No showers since the main generator went 
off, but there's some hot water, and I'll fix you some food."
"Thanks." Out of his suit he was a tall, thin man of forty, in sweat - stained 
and filthy fatigues. "I'm Special Agent Martell - Paul Martell, rank of major. 
And I'll take you up on all of that as soon as I finish check over. Do you 
suppose your hospitality could run to a suit of clean clothes?" He started, with 
dragging movements, on the mandatory checkout for leaving a spacesuit - on an 
airless world like Charmides you never knew when you might have to jump right 
back into it. So you serviced it immediately, dumping disinfectant into body - 
waste units, checking air - hoses, wiping rubber grommets with preservative. But 
Rawlins saw that the man could barely stand. "Go in and get cleaned up, Ma­jor," 
he said roughly. "I'll service the damn thing. Help yourself to anything that 
fits."
An hour later, bathed, shaved and dressed in some off - duty clothes of 
Rawlins', Major Martell lay stretched out on the sofa in the main dome, 
finishing his coffee.
"Before we get started, sir, what's the news from Port Major? We've been cut off 
for days," Feniston said. The major shook his head. "Not much. Remem­ber, I've 
been on the road for days myself. Oh, the Astraea landed with a new load fresh 
from Earthside -  greenest bunch of scared kids I ever saw. A bogey came within 
a few hundred feet of holing their shuttle, but before I left they were all on 
their feet and piling into Orientation One. By now, they're probably all on 
their way to their first stations - unless the storm hit Port Major before 
then."
Feniston did not even try to conceal his excitement. "Was my son among them? 
Michael Feniston, Junior?"
"Sorry, I just saw them in a clump. I didn't see any name labels. Is that your 
son?" He took the photocube from Feniston's desk and studied it a moment, then 
shook his head, frowning in a good - natured effort to remember. "Sorry. I seem 
to remember half a dozen of those lanky, dark - haired kids; I suppose he could 
have been there, but I couldn't say for sure." Feniston set down the cube. 
"Tough luck, this storm cutting you off just when he's coming in. Even if he 
tried to call you from Central, he'd have found that all the relays out this way 
have been cut off by the storm. Now you probably won't hear anything till he's 
settled down at his first station."
"Well, that's the way the breaks run," Feniston said, trying to conceal his 
disappointment. "Well, Ma­jor, I expect you want to make out your report on the 
accident."
It didn't take long. When Martell had finished, he put the sheet back over 
Rubichek, with impersonal sadness. "Poor devil. By the way, I checked with 
Records before I left Port Major. He never did fill out a Form A - 14. So 
there's no need to wait for transship­ment space; we can go ahead and dispose of 
the body. I suppose your units will handle it here?"
"Oh, sure. Even without the main generator work­ing." Feniston saw Rawlins 
flinch. "What's the mat­ter, kid? Seem cold - blooded?"
"I thought at least he'd be shipped back to Port Major for burial!"
"Not unless his family had requested it in advance, or he had. Like I said, I 
checked. That's a damn silly law anyhow," Martell said, "using valuable cargo 
space on dead bodies that belong in the disposal units. Sop to public relations, 
that's all," Martell said. Feniston looked at him in agreement. After the 
unspoken con­demnation that had blown like a stream of canned air, cold and 
sour, from Rawlins' direction for the last few days, it was good to have 
Martell's support. He saw the muscles move in Rawlins' throat, but the kid only 
cast a murderous glare at Feniston and bent to his work.
Disposal was a messy but, fortunately, a brief affair. Afterward they had supper 
in the dome, Feniston interrupting himself every few minutes to check the 
instruments. Rawlins ate little; Feniston, watching him with pity, wished there 
was something he could say.
Martell finally pushed back his chair, sighing. "I've made a pig of myself. You 
fellows in the domes live pretty well, don't you? Oh well, something pleasant 
against that beautiful trip I've got ahead of me. I wonder if I have time for a 
couple of hours sleep before I hit the road back? They say you can sleep in a 
Twelve Bug, but I wonder if the guy who put that in the manual had ever been in 
one?"
"Got my doubts about it." Feniston pulled down the clipboard and started on his 
rounds again. Rawlins sneered. "Sacred ritual under way again. You could write 
it without moving from your chair - nothing's working yet, and you know it."
"Can't tell till you try." Feniston moved a useless dial. "Major, why not stay 
till the storm clears? Start now, and you'll be three days on the road again; 
wait till it clears, and you can make it in five hours."
Rawlins' mouth twisted. "Wouldn't that be against your precious rule book?"
Feniston started to answer, but Martell, with one swift movement, rose and stood 
looking down at Raw­lins. "All right, mister, out with it. What's that chip on 
your shoulder? You've been dying to say something ever since I got here. Say it, 
or shut up!"
Rawlins shot to his feet. He swung from Feniston to Martell, with a trapped, 
desperate earnestness. "Damn it, we could have saved what's - his - name, 
Rubichek, that poor bastard we just cut up and put down the unit," he blurted. 
"We could have saved him, and we didn't! Feniston might just as well have killed 
him! The way I see it, Feniston murdered him!"
The dome was silent. Feniston heard, for the first time in years, the futile 
cricket chirps, bleeps, poops, ticks and tocks of his instruments. "Tom, I went 
all over that - "
"Wait." Martell held up his hand. "Let the kid have his say.
"Look, Major, I know I could have reached him. It was just a question of rigging 
a couple of tackles -  we've got the equipment downstairs. Then we could have 
switched off the surface wiring for a few minutes and gone out in suits. Sir, I 
was on the tumbling team in college, I'm damn near a professional acrobat, even 
in a suit; I know I could have reached him. Feniston wouldn't have had to risk 
his precious neck - "
"It wasn't the risk, dammit."
"Let the kid finish, Feniston."
"Since we'd both have been outside in suits, we could have cut out the gears in 
the air system and brought him up through the baffle. We would have had a 
fighting chance to get him up inside, and every­thing switched on again, before 
there was a direct nit - "
Martell held up his hand. "Spare me the details," he said. "I'm neither an 
electrician or a mechanic, and certainly no acrobat. I'll willingly concede that 
a proper rescue team could have reached the poor devil some­how. But you've said 
enough to convince me there was no negligence on your senior's part. Feniston, 
didn't you tell him why it wasn't possible to tamper with the dome mechanisms 
that way? And - how long have you been in Service, Rawlins? Surely you know the 
first rule is that both members must never be outside the dome at the same time 
- "
"Oh, the rules and regulations were coming out of his ears," Rawlins said 
passionately, "but I thought all rules were off when there was a life at stake! 
And there was, here! Rubichek died because Feniston couldn't let go of his damn 
rule book for ten lousy minutes. ..."
Martell's mouth was set. Feniston started to speak, but Martell gestured him to 
silence. "And suppose you'd been killed too," he said, "and Feniston was left 
alone here with two dead bodies to put into the dis­posal instead of one?"
"But I wouldn't have been killed - " Rawlins swal­lowed hard. His voice stopped 
working. Feniston put a hand on his shoulder, but Rawlins shook it off. "I 
suppose if I'd been out there, you'd have let me lie there and fry?"
"I hope to God that decision never comes up," Feniston said steadily.
"But you would?"
"I'd have to. I'd hate it, but I'd have to." Feniston bit his lip. "You're not 
Earthside now, or in a nice safe dome on Mars. When you're out here, the first 
thing you learn is to live by the rule book. Or you don't live long enough to 
learn anything else." He turned away and went to the instrument panel, not 
looking back.
"Okay, dammit, so you'd let me lie there and fry! But suppose it was somebody 
you cared about! Your son, maybe? How'd you stick to your precious damn rule 
book then?"
Feniston did not turn round. He said, "They wouldn't let Mike and me work in the 
same dome. Just for that reason. There's just so much human nature can take."
Martell said, half aloud, "The Branson kids. It was my first year out here."
Feniston nodded, not turning, remembering, trying not to remember. He said, 
"Yeah, I was on the wire that night. I was a junior then at Seventeen."
God, yes, the Bronsons. Dave and - what was his name, the little red - headed 
kid? Toby, that was it. Dave and Toby. Brothers. Not wanting to, his mind 
insisted on playing the tape again, obsessively; now he had started. The 
Bronsons had somehow, no one knew how they'd wangled it - Section Twenty - two 
wasn't on the books then - gotten assigned together to a dome. Feniston had been 
working the interdome relay the night Toby had gone out in his suit and somehow, 
God knows how, slid down a pile of rocks and broken his hip and - they found out 
later - his back. He lay out there and screamed for hours. God knows why he 
never lost consciousness. Begging, pleading. Then he got delirious and started 
talking to Dave over his suitcom like they were little kids back home. Every 
dome down the line heard it. Hours. Days. Rescue One made it about an hour after 
Toby stopped talking. And about ten minutes after Dave blew his brains out.
The dome had been darkened to maximum now, and the steel louvers closed, 
turtleshell, over the relay station. Martell went to look over Feniston's 
shoulder at one of the TV monitors.
"Looks like it might be easing up, now."
"Not really," said Feniston, looking at the newly cleared screen. "It clears up 
for a minute or two at a time, then starts again; there's a regular pulse to it. 
You can see Outside, if you want to, though."
"/ don't guess the scenery's much to look at," Martell said, with a wry grin. "I 
think I'll get that sleep - "
"God almighty!" Rawlins jerked as if he had been stung, and pointed. "Feniston, 
look-by the big rock out there! I guess I must be coming unstuck, thinking 
everything in the screen is electrical interference! Do you see it?"
"I thought I did. Let me try to clear it up again - " for the maddening swirls 
had covered the monitor once again. Martell had dropped right out of their 
consciousness. Again they were a team, operating to­gether at peak. "I think 
I've got it - I can't make it out. I thought it was a pile of rocks. Has there 
been another rockslide out there?"
"Maybe I'm crazy, sir, but I thought it looked like a crawler." They were 
kneeling side by side on the bench, systematically trying the TV monitors and 
the outside radar. "Look, that blip - try the signal chan­nels, one by one, will 
you?"
Confusing sounds crackled and blipped in random, infuriating patterns. It was 
Rawlins who flipped the switch that made him jerk back his hand as if it had 
shocked him; through the random static a loud, frantic blasting, a scream, 
shattered the silence in the dome. Feniston knew that Rawlins' horrified face 
only re­flected his own. He wet his lips. "God help us," he muttered.
"What is it, Mr. Feniston?" Martell's voice intruded on their consciousness, and 
Feniston said, "Rescue One Alert; Extreme Distress Signal, from the crawler out 
there. Loud and clear."
"Whatever's out there is in trouble, then?"
"Anything out there is in trouble by definition, Ma­jor, but that signal means 
extra - special trouble." Feniston was frantically trying the visuals again. "No 
damn good. Pull the louvers - put on your Dayside glasses first, dammit! Major, 
get your Dayside glasses on, or - with respect, sir - leave the dome. Get 
down­stairs."
Moving fast, Rawlins obeyed, while the major, whip­ping on his Dayside glasses, 
squeezed his eyes against the hellish brightness.
"By the big peak - my God," Rawlins almost whis­pered. "Look at that!"
Across the glaring, unstirring dust of Charmides, they could see now; a metal 
craft lay tilted sidewise, tractor treads up - ended, like some monster insect 
spilled helplessly on its back. Feniston sucked in his breath.
"God, those poor devils!"
The fierce sheet - lightning, never slackening, came and went with a searing 
glare. Feniston, his eyes wa­tering, pushed the button that closed the steel 
louvers, feeling the comparative darkness with relief. He went to the 
transmitter and, without much hope, started sending. Voice reception would be 
drowned by static; this was the archaic dot - dash, electrical - pulse language, 
kept for just such emergencies. Static would probably drown it out too, but he 
had to try.
"Relay Station Twelve calling, crawler, calling crawler - come in, crawler. ..." 
He sent the message again and again, his nerves screaming with the relent­less, 
automatic shrilling of the Extreme Distress Sig­nal, which, preset, would keep 
blasting on all frequencies until someone answered it. It was a long time before 
the static gave them a returning trickle of weak dashes and dots. "Relay . . . 
need assistance . . . crawler Fourteen - oh - nine, down in sector . . . need 
assist. . . ."
"Crawler, we have your position, we can see you from the Relay Station. Can you 
make the dome? Have you spacesuits and ground equipment?" He waited, endlessly, 
for an answer that did not come. Rawlins fiddled with the receivers and managed 
to lower the Extreme Distress blast to an endurable ear level, making the joke 
all the new men thought was funny, about an extremely distressing signal. 
"Dam­mit, why don't they answer?"
"They may be answering, and the static cut out their answer," Feniston said. 
"Or, of course, there may not be anyone alive in there - or anyone in a 
condition to answer." Feniston went to the relief map of the sur­rounding 
terrain and marked the crawler's position in erasable crayon. "Those crawlers 
don't just turn over. Probably the cliff above the road crumbled, and every­body 
inside is smashed to hell."
"Then who answered your signal?" Martell asked, but it needed no answer. The 
answerer might now be unconscious or dead inside the smashed crawler, or think 
himself safer inside an insulated crawler than he would be trying to make it to 
the dome in an ordinary spacesuit. Feniston was trying bands again, hopelessly, 
one by one. Abruptly, like a special miracle, the static momentarily quieted, 
and from one band came the first human voice the men in the Relay Station had 
heard in days.
"This is Rescue One. Rescue One. This is a special emergency band; state the 
nature of your emergency or get off this frequency at once."
"Rescue One, this is Relay Station Twelve. There is a downed crawler directly 
visible from relay windows, emitting Extreme Distress Signal. Inhabitants do not 
reply to call." Feniston went on, quickly reporting position, time and local 
conditions before the worsen­ing storm should cut him off again. The voice at 
Res­cue One said, "No crawler is scheduled to be within two kilometers of Relay 
Twelve, but someone may have been navigating on instruments that went out in the 
storm. We'll investigate when we can."
"How long?"
"No promises; we're snowed under here, and we have emergencies calling for help, 
men we know are alive. If you get any acknowledgment from them again, call us 
with the data. Otherwise, we'll assume they're dead or dying and leave them till 
we have the live ones rescued. Now get off this band, Relay Twelve, we're 
swamped. Rescue One, out."
Feniston watched young Rawlins pacing the floor, staring at the steel shutters. 
"Can't we do anything?"
"The young hero, raring to go again?" Martell frowned at Feniston. "Are you game 
for an extra hour on shift, Feniston? If you can run things awhile, I'll take 
Rawlins and go out. Maybe we can find out, at least, if there's anyone alive in 
there and get Rescue One to put them on a priority."
Feniston consulted the chronometer. "Oh, sure," he said, "I can work straight 
through Tom's shift, if I have to; mark it down as Emergency Status. Go ahead."
He heard them go clanging down the metal stairway and felt, suddenly, very old 
and tired. They didn't even consider me for the rescue work. Oh, sure, it makes 
sense to pick the younger man.
But it would have felt good, rules or no, to do the human thing for once. To get 
out there, all of us, leave the station to look after itself and fight the black 
glare for those men's lives. . . .
And they didn't even ask me. . . .
Time crawled by grimly, stretching minutes until they felt like quarter hours, 
and hours into days. Now and then Feniston put on dayside glasses and drew the 
shutters back, scanning the burning rocks for some sign of the two suited 
figures. Once he saw them, crawling slowly between two great rocks, then lost 
them again in the shadows.
He followed them a little while longer through the confused, flickering shadows 
of the TV monitor, then lost them once and for all. Time crawled on, stretched 
out and finally lost meaning and merged into eternity. Hours later, when the 
steel shutters had been drawn back and the dark fluid adjusted to opaque the 
dome, he heard a noise downstairs at the airlock, then drag­ging, uneven steps 
from the hatchway. Rawlins, filthy and exhausted, hauled Martell into the dome.
"No good," muttered Martell, and slumped; Feniston sprang to help him into a 
chair, and he lay there collapsed, not moving. Rawlins, too, looked dead beat.
"Hell out there . . . ," Martell whispered, "almost got fried by - close hits. 
Got within half a kilometer and I - slid. Pulled muscle - back. Hadn't been for 
the kid - still be lying out there."
Rawlins straddled a chair, his head slumped on the back. "Crawler's turned over 
- door jammed shut, need a torch to burn them out - I heard them hammering 
inside - alive, all right - later I'll take a torch and go back - "
Martell pulled himself painfully upright. A kind of respect was mingled with his 
annoyance. "You don't give up easy, do you?"
"Not with lives at stake. Hell, no, sir! You want to sit and watch them die?"
Martell groaned and lay back. "In my case it's aca­demic; until that ligament in 
my back heals up, I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to catch hell from Central. 
A few hundred feet more, and you'd have had to leave me out there." He smiled 
grimly. "Feniston, the damn - fool kid half carried me in. Rawlins, I'm sorry, 
it was a good try, but there's nothing more we can do. We'll call in and tell 
Rescue One that they're alive in there and that we've done all we can."
Before Rawlins could muster the confused words that were gathering, Feniston 
explained it again, gently. "Tom, we don't have rescue facilities here. We've 
got to leave them for Rescue One. I know how you feel - "
"The hell you do!" Rawlins had gone white under the dirt on his face. "You don't 
know a goddamn thing but your stinking rule book!"
"Look," Martell said, "in the long run, regulations cover situations with the 
greatest good for the greatest number - and the least danger. Charmides is short 
of qualified men, but it's better for two men to die wait­ing for Rescue One to 
get around to them than for a well - meaning amateur to take a hand and have 
three corpses to bury."
The color had returned to Rawlins' face in irregular patches, and white showed 
all around the pupils of his eyes. "You damned - monsters," he all but screamed. 
"You stinking, inhuman - "
Feniston knew the kid was hysterical, but he, too, had had all he could take.
"That's enough, mister. Get down to your quarters and get some sleep. You go on 
shift again in two hours. Damn it, that's an order. Move!"
Rawlins didn't move. Feniston, thought, almost incredulous, he's going to cry. 
But he didn't. Finally he turned on his heel, and his feet clanged on the metal 
stairway.
Poor, damned fool of a kid. . . .
Martell said it aloud. "Poor kid. Damn - fool kid."
Feniston covered his face with his hands. He finally said, mastering the curious 
pain, "He'll get over it."
"Yeah, I know. Someday he'll be just like all the rest of us, learn to line it 
up like double - entry book­keeping. With reason, logic and good sense on one 
side, and common humanity on the other. And he'll even sleep nights after he 
learns it."
Feniston didn't look around at him. He only said, "There's some codeine in the 
medix box. I'd better get you some for your back, Major."
Martell dozed feverishly on the sofa; Feniston wea­rily went through the rounds 
at his panel. He was ready to drop; he had worked sixteen hours straight. At the 
end of the two hours' grace he had given Rawlins, he buzzed Rawlins' quarters, 
thinking long­ingly of a shave, some hot soup, and a good long sleep. Yeah, I'm 
getting old. Where the hell is Rawlins?
There was no answering buzz from below; Feniston swore, and Martell opened his 
eyes, started to sit up, winced and didn't. "Where's the kid? Still playing 
Achilles - sulking - in - his - tent?"
"Probably dead asleep," Feniston said slowly, "but this buzzer would wake up the 
Sphinx. Maybe it's gone out of service. With the main generator out, nothing 
works right." He was beginning to worry. In the Service, quarters had doors. On 
an airless world where you lived in domes, privacy meant sanity. But the doors 
had no locks. So if your junior went stir - crazy and tried to suicide, he 
couldn't lock himself in to finish the job ... he hit the buzzer hard and 
re­peatedly, swore, clanged down the metal ladder and banged, hard, on Rawlins' 
door. "Rawlins! Hey - Tom, damn it, you're on - shift! Get the hell up here!"
He thrust open the door. The bed was dented, not slept in. Feniston retraced his 
steps, an awful suspicion growing on him.
His own quarters were bare and shipshape; the tiny galley empty and clean. 
Finally there was nowhere else to look, and Feniston's steps dragged as he 
turned toward the airlock room.
Empty, but the light glowed on the panel.
WHEN THIS LIGHT IS ON
SOMEONE IS OUT.
DO NOT FASTEN DOOR
FROM INSIDE.
And Rawlins' spacesuit was gone. 
He didn't have to tell Martell what had happened. The major swore, unprintably. 
Feniston slumped.
"What could I have done? Short of putting him under arrest in advance?"
"I know, damn it," Martell muttered. "I couldn't be too rough on him. Damn kid 
saved my life."
"Well, it's out of our hands now." Feniston, shaking with fatigue, dropped on 
the bench. His body felt as if it was permanently molded to it. He pulled down 
the log and wrote down the time, adding: "Unable to assign panel to second 
officer account - " His hand­writing, he noticed with the glassy clarity of a 
brain fatigued almost to breaking point, had gone illegible. He braced his hand 
and printed in block capitals: RAWLINS AWOL.
Martell said, "Feniston, you've been working six­teen hours straight. You'll 
keel over. Can I take the panel?"
"Good of you, sir. But - against regulations to let an outsider on the panel. 
I'll get some wakers from the medix box." He went and swallowed the drug, 
waiting for the burst of energy. This is against regs too, except in 
emergencies. Well, we've got one hell of an emergency.
I had such hopes for the kid. As if he was filling in for Mike. And for his own 
sake, too. For the time when I wasn't around any more.
Martell muttered, when he came back, "I wonder if he realized we'll have to send 
Rescue One after him too?"
"I don't know what he thinks. Or if he thinks." Feniston hit the button. 
Miraculously, there was a clear channel. For once, Feniston wished there hadn't 
been. But he knew what he had to do, and he did it. His voice faltered a little 
as he reported Rawlins AWOL. It's just fatigue, he told himself. But he knew it 
wasn't.
Time wasn't time any more. Martell dozed, pain and codeine winning out over 
anxiety. Feniston stayed awake, half sick with the reaction from the wakers in 
his system, mingled with anger. Once he tried to pick up Rawlins on the TV 
monitor, but the bubble - dome's own revolving shadow cut off the light. Radar 
picked up a small, just - moving fleck that was about the right size for a man 
in a spacesuit. As the hours crawled by, Feniston's anger mingled with fear. 
Against his own will, something of the rage, the determination of Raw - tins' 
fight with death got through to the older man.
He felt an atavistic, almost savage approval as that little fleck crawled 
buglike across the screen. Every inch was a half mile nearer, across the 
crackling hell out there. A hazard surmounted. A margin of safety gained. It was 
a purely human reaction, logic aside, and Feniston didn't try to fight it. And 
as the little fleck neared the dome again on the return journey, for the first 
time in his thirty years Feniston forgot his panel checks. The last hundred feet 
were the worst. Feniston had exhausted his supply of desperation. He breathed 
with the flicker of light that was Rawlins on the radar. Easy now . . . watch 
the rocks out there . . . if this was a house you'd be on the front lawn . . . 
he's going to make it back, by God he's going to make it. . . .
Roughly he went and shook Martell awake. "Open the shutters! Can you get him on 
visual?"
Martell hobbled to the control, groping for his Day - side glasses. "Can't see - 
oh, God, look what that crazy kid did! He took my Twelve Bug - wouldn't hold all 
of them, so he's adapted the crawler panel - they're riding on top of it! 
Rawlins and - one, two - three of the men from the crawler! On one damn Twelve 
Bug!"
Another charge against him, Unlawful use and adaptation. . . .
"He's rigged a lightning deflector - yes, damn it, I know as well as you do ... 
Feniston, my God, look at that crazy kid - "
"Told you he was a clever youngster," Feniston growled. But he didn't come and 
look. He didn't look at all.
And then it was over. Quietly, like an anticlimax, Feniston heard the airlock 
open, the hiss of the de­compression room, and four men struggled up the steps 
into the dome. Rawlins and another man were carrying a third between them; the 
fourth man was limping, but he was on his feet. Feniston turned from the panel.
"Well, Tom!" It was welcome, grateful prayer of thanks, and unutterable 
weariness, all in one.
Rawlins smiled. His clothes clung like wet wash to his body. He wiped his face 
with a dripping sleeve and said blissfully, "I made it, sir."
The third man straightened. "Maydon, sir. I thought we'd had it for sure. He 
almost killed himself getting us out." He gestured to the man Rawlins had helped 
to carry, now lying inert on the sofa. "I thought sure the kid here wasn't going 
to make it, but now I guess he's got a chance."
Feniston said briefly, "I guess we can look after you all here until the men 
from Rescue One make it. Do any of you have a cert to fix a generator?"
"Yeah, me," Maydon said, staring at Rawlins. "You mean you're not from Rescue 
One? Man, I want to shake your hand!"
Rawlins gleamed at Feniston as Maydon wrung his hand. "I told you I could do it, 
sir! Regulations be damned! I told you - "
Maydon stopped dead. He dropped Rawlins' hand and stared, saying slowly, "Hey, 
you mean - "
"Later, Maydon," Feniston said. "Go below, Raw­lins."
"You damn old sourpuss," Rawlins burst out, "All right - so raise hell, raise 
hell because I walked all over your precious rule book. I saved three men's 
lives. Can't you get that through your damned thick head. I saved three lives! 
And will you have a look at this other kid here before he dies on us? Or is that 
against the rule book too?"
Feniston bent over the wounded man.
And froze there. It's just an insane, obscene night­mare. And now, at last, 
after all this, I can wake up - 
But he didn't. Gripped by nightmare, paralyzed, Feniston saw the wounded man's 
face. Crushed and dirty and bloody, eyes closed in weakness and exhaus­tion, 
Feniston saw the face of his son Mike.
"No," Feniston said, thickly, "No! Oh, God, Mike!"
Rawlins was so near collapse himself that he ab­sorbed the shock without 
surprise. "... glad," he mumbled, "heard nothing out of you for a month but Mike 
. . . maybe take the curse off ... have a heart. ..."
Mike Feniston opened his eyes. To an impersonal watcher - if there were any - he 
would have been only a nice - looking kid of twenty or so, who should never have 
been brought all these millions of miles from Earth to be smashed and left to 
fry inside a broken crawler in the hell of Charmides. He looked at his father 
without curiosity, as if the last hours had held so many shocks that nothing 
could ever surprise him again.
"I made it, Dad," he whispered through bleeding lips, "only I goofed. Guess you 
won't be very proud of me, goofing up the works first thing. . . ."he 
whis­pered, and died.
Rawlins' tears rolled down, unashamed, and fell on Mike's face. "God! I'm so 
sorry, sir, so sorry - I did my best - I'd have risked my life twice over - "
"You did just exactly that, didn't you?" Feniston let go of Mike's hand. It was 
cold, now, and limp. "Quite the hero."
"I was glad to do it, sir." Rawlins, for all his filth stood there, somehow 
shining. "I like to think anyone in the Service would have done the same thing."
He means it. Feniston thought. And realized for the first time how the old 
cliches could seem, somehow, new and meaningful, with bright new sharp edges on 
them. He breathed deep, feeling the hurt down where pain still had meaning, 
knowing that his next words would sear away that shining thing in the boy 
forever. He had never hated anything so much in his life.
"Major Martell, I request that you place Rawlins under arrest. Reasons: general 
lack of discipline, in­subordination, direct defiance of an order, and 
unlaw­fully modifying equipment outside the regular field of his duty." His 
mouth was dry, empty of words. Martell's face was compassionate, but Feniston, 
floundering in his own pain, saw only Rawlins. The shine had gone out of the 
young hero's face; now he was just a beaten, exhausted kid.
"I - I - did I hear you right? Arrest? For saving a - for saving three lives?"
Martell rapped, "For risking your own life, almost making it four deaths, and 
unauthorized use of a Sur­face Transit Twelve - B. You were dumb and lucky, 
Rawlins. But out here you don't gamble on dumb luck, or heroics! Nobody gets a 
second chance out here, and you had yours!"
"I - " Rawlins looked around for something, some­one, but there was only 
Martell, like a judgment of God. Feniston knew he would never forget that 
de­spairing sweep of Rawlins' head around the dome, as if appealing to a higher 
court for justice, before Martell took him by the arm, not unkindly.
"Better get below, mister. You'll be going back to Port Major with me - and 
probably out on the Astraea, return trip to Earth."
Rawlins stumbled on the metal rung. "Okay," he muttered, and Feniston knew that 
the whole dead load of fatigue was finally caving in on the kid, crushing him at 
last. "Okay. All right if I get a little - little sleep first? I'm dead."
And as he stumbled down the stairs, Feniston heard the sobs break out, thick, 
exhausted sobs of a hero beaten down to a whipped kid who still couldn't figure 
out what had hit him -  - and probably never would.
Blind with pain, Feniston turned to Maydon. "You're certified. You take the 
panel. Emergency," he mut­tered. He felt his face crumple as he looked down into 
the face of his dead son. Like Rawlins' dream, his own life had crumbled into 
the dust and rubble of that quiet hell that was Charmides. He pulled a blanket 
over Mike's face.
And they won't even let me stay here to die. . . .
Mechanically, under the dimming glare, he adjusted the darkeners; the black sky 
of Charmides opened up, endless as space itself, over his head. He looked over 
his son's body into the blackness, but he didn't see it.
"I had two sons, really," he said in a hoarse, old man's voice, to no one in 
particular, "and today I lost them both."
He put his arm over his eyes. He would be very glad to get back to Earth.
(1976)
 
The Engine
 
I am hating the Engine.
Yes of course I know that it is the miracle of our century, that no man, and 
especially no woman, now suffers from deprivation as they have done from the 
dawn of history. It certainly was a barbarian thing, to leave the satisfaction 
of an instinct so vital to the chance clumsiness of mutual attraction or purely 
sub­jective emotions, or to deny it, perhaps, to those who need it most. The 
Engine takes care of all that. It reliably monitors all the reflexes, even to 
the redden­ing of the ear lobes and the painless contractions of the womb, so 
that nothing is left to chance.
A half-hour treatment on the Engine twice a month and all that tension and 
neurosis is ended forever. The neo-Reichians proved, a long time ago, how 
valuable it was, but not until the genius who invented the Engine could we free 
ourselves from the kind of depri­vation that led not only to neurotic behavior 
and hys­teria but to physical pathologies such as cancer and social pathologies 
such as war.
But I am still hating the Engine.
It is not painful this time, it has not been painful since I was twelve or so. 
The Med says my responses are boringly normal. Yet I wonder if all women feel, 
as I do, the numb terror and humiliation when feet are locked up into the 
stirrups and the sensors snake down to attach themselves to the areas richest in 
nerve endings.
I go to the trouble of reading the little booklet the Meds will give you, if you 
ask, about understanding the Engine, even though my Med warns against it. "Don't 
intellectualize," he tells me; "simply give your­self up to the physical 
experience. It is completely programmed and monitors all your responses. You 
don't need to know how or why it works. Simply give yourself up to it. It is 
more beneficial that way."
Yet I read the book, finding to my chagrin that it only gives diagrams of nerve 
- fiber bundles and ana­tomical drawings that I find too grotesque to look at. I 
was hoping for something to explain the resentment, the hatred, the wrath, but 
nothing of that sort, just stories of all the ailments women had had before this 
century, ailments directly traceable to the lack of the Engine.
I am angriest when I have to take the main appli­ance in my hands and insert it 
myself. Of course now I am sticky with my own secretions and the mechanical 
lubricant that the sensors supply in precisely optimum amounts, compensating for 
lack or oversupply. I hate the smell of the mechanical lubricant, the smooth 
soft slickness between my fingers. Loathsome, like some animal. Yet once I 
program for mechanical entry I cannot endure watching the slow, seeking 
approach, the numb nuzzling, the sudden hard shock so that I hear myself 
screaming like the women in the other cubicles. Then the worst is over. I try to 
relax and let the Engine monitor the responses I cannot control or resist. Even 
that I resent, resent the way it takes control of consciousness, so that I 
writhe, I gasp, cry out, scream like the other women I can faintly hear, until 
the moment when even sound blacks out. I am boringly normal, the Med declares. I 
have had preorgasmic treatment only once or twice since I was fourteen. And only 
two or three times do I attempt to resist the Engine, experiment with inhibiting 
response, and the Med says most adolescents do that once or twice too, simply a 
way of experimenting, testing their own responses. After all, they remind me, it 
does not matter, the sensors are programmed to occasional re­sistance, they can 
monitor it in skin tension and internal pulses, and they are programmed to 
linger as long as needed on manipulations of nerve - rich areas, which finally 
diminish even the most determined resistance.
And after this the responses and detensioning are so powerful that one is 
lassitudinous and weak, too weak to walk, and I find it worse humiliation to be 
helped gently out of the cubicle by a Med and given stimu­lants in view of the 
waiting line of women outside the cubicles, twelve - year - olds frightened or 
grinning in bra­vado before their early treatments, married women coming in for 
detension monitoring weekly, menopausal spinsters for the more frequent 
treatment, which prevents the physical and nervous degeneration that used to set 
in at that time.
Once I apply for exemption. Sometimes women are exempt because of low vitality 
or ill health, and I wonder if my hatred of the Engine betrays some such 
unsuspected condition, when I am perfectly well aware of how beneficial the 
treatments are. I take all the tests, watch them checking my psych profile, 
actually monitoring, live rather than by sensor, one or two treatments. I am so 
nervous at the thought of the living monitor behind the controls  - that I 
resist the Engine and have to be given reprogramming for resis­tance and 
preorgasmic treatment for the first time since I was fourteen. But they say that 
is normal too under the circumstances. The Meds are kind, as all androids are 
always kind. But afterward they show me the spiked curve of those boringly 
normal responses, and then show me the flattened ones of women who have 
legitimate exemptions, who cannot respond even after manual programming and 
preorgasmic treatment. Such women comprise three point two in a thousand, they 
tell me, and most of them are heart cases or chronic low thyroids or severe 
mental retardates. I don't mention hate. What is the point of mentioning a 
purely subjective reality?
Lorn is deviling me again to marry him. I remember that marriage is a legal 
exemption. It might be worth trying. We apply for marriage permits, have our 
psych profiles checked and our legal status reregistered, ap­ply for joint 
housing. I go in for my marriage exemp­tion and am warned to come in every seven 
days for detension monitoring. I am told, to my shocked amaze­ment, that I am 
always free to request extra sessions up to the legal maximum of three times a 
week. Again I wonder if I am unique, the only woman to feel this resistance and 
hatred. But I cling to the notion that I need never go on the Engine again, if 
detensioning is complete, while the marriage endures.
Lorn is very much in love. I try to match his eager­ness. He is sweet, 
companionable. The Engine, I know, has made marriage less risky; no man now 
needs to marry for the detensioning and physical relief which the Engine can 
legally give him. I am shown drawings of the male models so that we will know 
about one another's experience. I am also told that now there is less pressure 
on a man's virility, since the Engine is always there to supplement detensioning 
to the exact level necessary. The men's model is even more gro­tesque, round and 
neutral, pouched, plastic pink and obscenely soft. It has fewer auxiliary 
sensors because the male erogenous zones are more narrowly located.
We are together. For a moment I wonder if I can respond to him as readily as the 
computer - controlled sensors do, but he seems content. I am startled to see 
that men, too, cry out and writhe in the grip of the reflexes. The smell is 
subtly different from the me­chanical lubricant, but Lorn tells me that is 
imagi­nation, the chemical composition is precisely equivalent, and synthetic 
hormones are exact equivalents. I feel very tender. I am surprised and excited 
when he does not discover the richest nerve endings as the sensors do, but the 
very excitement makes me respond. I am ashamed to cry out as I do in the 
cubicle, but I find myself weeping, and he is dismayed. I tell him truth­fully 
that it is from happiness. I love him. Lorn is my freedom.
I go for detension monitoring. The Med says it is not quite complete, and 
recommends - it is not compulsory - a treatment; I refuse, and he prescribes a 
relaxation exercise. It is better with Lorn the next time, even though I am 
troubled. If detension is not complete they will put me on the Engine again. I 
cry, I beg him for some of the nerve touches which the computer has discovered 
are my most responsive. He does his best, and this time I am sure it is 
complete.
I am completely happy. I go to work; Lorn and I sleep together, eat together, 
experiment with man­ual cooking - Lorn thinks it is not sanitary, but I tell him 
that for thousands of years humanity lived on such foods and substances. They 
have a subtle, different flavor, not quite like synthetics. He says that is my 
imagination too. For the first time since I was twelve years old, I go from week 
to week without thought of the upcoming Engine appointment. I am happy.
Yet the weekly detension monitorings frighten me, too. I am always recommended 
for relaxation therapy, even though they do not demand Engine treatment. I grow 
more and more worried, find myself begging Lorn to help me. It must succeed! It 
must!
A week comes when the detension monitoring ends in the Red Zone. They send me 
into the line for the cubicle. I cry all the time my feet are locked into the 
stirrups. I scream, I resist the machine, I resist so long that I am finally 
given override programming and come out weak, unable to walk. I cry all the time 
the Meds are giving me stimulants; I stop only when they tell me I must have 
successful detension monitoring before I go home, and crying like this will 
inhibit the monitor­ing and give false responses. Again I cry, on the way home, 
and Lorn is desperate; I cry, I accuse him, I tell him that it is his fault that 
he could not give me the detensioning I need so desperately. We make it up in 
one another's arms, but I am too limp to respond after the long purgatory of the 
cubicle. He grows angry, then is frightened when I cannot stop crying. He wants 
to call a Med. I beg him not to, stifle my sobs. I fall asleep hating him, 
wanting to die, but he is contrite, begs me for forgiveness, says we will try 
again.
We are gentle with one another now, and courte­ous. We try to relax with one 
another, and my next two detension monitorings come clear. The Med has told me 
that there are many early problems of adjust­ment. Maybe the worst is over. I 
touch Lorn gently, marveling at his soft liveness. I love him. I rest in his 
arms, happy.
Later he asks me for something I find myself unable to do. Surely there are no 
nerve endings there! But he pleads until I try. I am sickened, I retch, I rush 
away to vomit. He is angry at first, then contrite. But he asks again and again. 
Finally, when I refuse, he tells me angrily that if I refuse him he will go to 
the Engine, that the Engine's sensors have determined his needs and this is not 
unreasonable. I scream at him to go to the Engine and be damned. He stares at me 
in shock, and we end in one another's arms.
I think he is punishing me for my refusal. Four nights he lies silent beside me, 
without a touch. At first I am stubborn, I say nothing. On the fourth night I 
begin to worry. My detension monitoring is tomor­row, and I will surely end in 
the Red Zone again. I tell him, and he takes me gently in his arms, but nothing 
happens. I am sure he has been going to the Engine for what he asked me and I 
refused.
We cannot go on like this! I am frantic, knowing I am tense and will surely fail 
my monitoring. I want to shriek insults at him. This once I message the center, 
giving them my ident, saying I have a chill and must skip the monitoring this 
week. They accept the excuse so easily I am elated. I will use it as often as I 
can.
Time passes and so far I am free of the Engine, but Lorn is going, I am sure, 
for legal supplementation. Since our psych profiles were matched for, 
complemen­tary needs, I am afraid that the supplementation will lessen his 
energy, leaving him less able to give me the detensioning I need. I grow more 
and more fright­ened. It is humiliating to go for detension monitoring when I 
know it is programmed on my card that my husband has applied for legal 
supplementation for need.
I beg him to work a little more on the nerve fibers always programmed for my 
major needs. He refuses. Finally he lashes out at me, "Detension monitoring, 
detension monitoring, it is all you ever think about! I can never simply enjoy 
being with you any more!"
I flare at him, "Why do you think I married you? You were the only legal 
exemption I could get!"
Ice cold, we stare at one another. His voice is cold.
"Do you want a divorce?"
I shrug. "Why bother? This is a comfortable apart­ment. We can get in another 
bed if you would rather."
I do not bother to go for detension monitoring the next day. I am humiliated, 
but I fill out a card for legal supplementation. I program it for mechanical 
entry. I will resist, I will fight, they will give me preorgasmic treatment, I 
will come out too weak to walk, enjoy the stimulants, let them send me home in a 
public convey­ance. I will not worry about Lorn. He is entitled to legal 
supplementation from the Engine.
(1977)
 
 
The Secret of the Blue Star
 
On a night in Sanctuary, when the streets bore a false glamour in the silver 
glow of full moon, so that every ruin seemed an enchanted tower and every dark 
street and square an island of mystery, the mercenary - magician Lythande 
sallied forth to seek adventure.
Lythande had but recently returned - if the mysteri­ous comings and goings of a 
magician can be called by so prosaic a name - from guarding a caravan across the 
Grey Wastes to Twand. Somewhere in the Wastes, a gaggle of desert rats - two - 
legged rats with poisoned steel teeth - had set upon the caravan, not knowing it 
was guarded by magic, and had found themselves fight­ing skeletons that howled 
and fought with eyes of flame; and at their center a tall magician with a blue 
star between blazing eyes, a star that shot lightnings of a cold and paralyzing 
flame. So the desert rats ran, and never stopped running until they reached 
Aurvesh, and the tales they told did Lythande no harm except in the ears of the 
pious.
And so there was gold in the pockets of the long, dark magician's robe, or 
perhaps concealed in what­ever dwelling sheltered Lythande.
For at the end, the caravan master had been almost more afraid of Lythande than 
he was of the bandits, a situation which added to the generosity with which he 
rewarded the magician. According to custom, Lythande neither smiled nor frowned, 
but remarked, days later, to Myrtis, the proprietor of the Aphrodisia House in 
the Street of Red Lanterns, that sorcery, while a use­ful skill and filled with 
many aesthetic delights for the contemplation of the philosopher, in itself put 
no beans on the table.
A curious remark, that; Myrtis pondered, putting away the ounce of gold Lythande 
had bestowed upon her in consideration of a secret which lay many years behind 
them both. Curious that Lythande should speak of beans on the table, when no one 
but herself had ever seen a bit of food or a drop of drink pass the magician's 
lips since the blue star had adorned that high and narrow brow. Nor had any 
woman in the Quarter ever been able to boast that a great magician had paid for 
her favors, or been able to imagine how such a magician behaved in that 
situation when all men were alike reduced to flesh and blood.
Perhaps Myrtis could have told if she would; some of her girls thought so, when, 
as sometimes happened, Lythande came to the Aphrodisia House and was clo­seted 
long with its owner; even, on rare intervals, for an entire night. It was said, 
of Lythande, that the Aphrodisia House itself had been the magician's gift to 
Myrtis, after a famous adventure still whispered in the bazaar, involving an 
evil wizard, two horse - traders, a caravan master, and a few assorted toughs 
who had prided themselves upon never giving gold for any woman and thought it 
funny to cheat an honest work­ing woman. None of them had ever showed their 
faces - what was left of them - in Sanctuary again, and Myrtis boasted that she 
need never again sweat to earn her living, and never again entertain a man, but 
would claim her madam's privilege of a solitary bed.
And then, too, the girls thought, a magician of Lythande's stature could have 
claimed the most beau­tiful women from Sanctuary to the mountains beyond Ilsig; 
not courtesans alone, but princesses and noble­women and priestesses would have 
been for Lythande's taking. Myrtis had doubtless been beautiful in her youth, 
and certainly she boasted enough of the princes and wizards and travelers who 
had paid great sums for her love. She was beautiful still (and of course there 
were those who said that Lythande did not pay her, but that, on the contrary, 
Myrtis paid the magician great sums to maintain her aging beauty with strong 
magic) but her hair had gone gray and she no longer troubled to dye it with 
henna or golden wash from Tyris - beyond - the - sea.
But if Myrtis were not the woman who knew how Lythande behaved in that most 
elemental of situa­tions, then there was no woman in Sanctuary who could say. 
Rumor said also that Lythande called up female demons from the Grey Wastes, to 
couple in lechery, and certainly Lythande was neither the first nor the last 
magician of whom that could be said.
But on this night Lythande sought neither food nor drink nor the delights of 
amorous entertainment; al­though Lythande was a great frequenter of taverns, no 
man had ever yet seen a drop of ale or mead or fire - drink pass the barrier of 
the magician's lips. Lythande walked along the far edge of the bazaar, skirting 
the old rim of the governor's palace, keeping to the shadows in defiance of 
footpads and cutpurses, out of that love for shadows which made the folk of the 
city say that Lythande could appear and disappear into thin air.
Tall and thin, Lythande, above the height of a tall man, lean to emaciation, 
with the blue star - shaped tattoo of the Magician - Adept above thin, arching 
eye­brows; wearing a long, hooded robe which melted into the shadows. Clean - 
shaven, the face of Lythande, or beardless - none had come close enough, in 
living mem­ory, to say whether this was the whim of an effeminate or the 
hairlessness of a freak. The hair beneath the hood was as long and luxuriant as 
a woman's, but graying, as no woman in this city of harlots would have allowed 
it to do.
Striding quickly along a shadowed wall, Lythande stepped through an open door, 
over which the sandal of Thufir, god of pilgrims, had been nailed up for luck; 
but the footsteps were so soft, and the hooded robe blended so well into the 
shadows, that eyewitnesses would later swear, truthfully, that they had seen 
Lythande appear from the air, protected by sorceries, or by a cloak of 
invisibility.
Around the hearthfire, a group of men were bang­ing their mugs noisily to the 
sound of a rowdy drinking - song, strummed on a worn and tinny lute - Lythande 
knew it belonged to the tavern - keeper, and could be borrowed - by a young man, 
dressed in fragments of foppish finery, torn and slashed by the chances of the 
road. He was sitting lazily, with one knee crossed over the other; and when the 
rowdy song died away, the young man drifted into another, a quiet love - song 
from another time and another country. Lythande had known the song, more years 
ago than bore remember­ing, and in those days Lythande the magician had borne 
another name and had known little of sorcery. When the song died, Lythande had 
stepped from the shadows, visible, and the firelight glinted on the blue star, 
mocking at the center of the high forehead.
There was a little muttering in the tavern, but they were not unaccustomed to 
Lythande's invisible com­ings and goings. The young man raised eyes which were 
surprisingly blue beneath the black hair elabo­rately curled above his brow. He 
was slender and agile, and Lythande marked the rapier at his side, which looked 
well handled, and the amulet, in the form of a coiled snake, at his throat. The 
young man said, "Who are you, who has the habit of coming and going into thin 
air like that?"
"One who compliments your skill at song." Lythande flung a coin to the tapster's 
boy. "Will you drink?"
"A minstrel never refuses such an invitation. Sing­ing is dry work." But when 
the drink was brought, he said, "Not drinking with me, then?"
"No man has ever seen Lythande eat or drink," muttered one of the men in the 
circle round them.
"Why, then, I hold that unfriendly," cried the young minstrel. "A friendly drink 
between comrades shared is one thing; but I am no servant to sing for pay or to 
drink except as a friendly gesture!"
Lythande shrugged, and the blue star above the high brow began to shimmer and 
give forth blue light. The onlookers slowly edged backward, for when a wizard 
who wore the blue star was angered, bystand­ers did well to be out of the way. 
The minstrel set down the lute, so it would be well out of range if he must leap 
to his feet. Lythande knew, by the excruciat­ing slowness of his movements and 
great care, that he had already shared a good many drinks with chance - met 
comrades. But the minstrel's hand did not go to his sword hilt but instead 
closed like a fist over the amulet in the form of a snake.
"You are like no man I have ever met before," he observed mildly, and Lythande, 
feeling inside the little ripple, nerve - long, that told a magician he was in 
the presence of spell casting, hazarded quickly that the am­ulet was one of 
those which would not protect its master unless the wearer first stated a set 
number of truths - usually three or five - about the owner's at­tacker or foe. 
Wary, but amused, Lythande said, "A true word. Nor am I like any man you will 
ever meet, live you never so long, minstrel."
The minstrel saw, beyond the angry blue glare of the star, a curl of friendly 
mockery in Lythande's mouth. He said, letting the amulet go, "And I wish you no 
ill; and you wish me none, and those are true sayings, too, wizard, hey? And 
there's an end of that. But although perhaps you are like to no other, you are 
not the only wizard I have seen in Sanctuary who bears a blue star about his 
forehead."
Now the blue star blazed rage, but not for the minstrel. They both knew it. The 
crowd around them had all mysteriously discovered that they had business 
elsewhere. The minstrel looked at the empty benches.
"I must go elsewhere to sing for my supper, it seems."
"I meant you no offense when I refused to share a drink," said Lythande. "A 
magician's vow is not as lightly overset as a lute. Yet I may guest - gift you 
with dinner and drink in plenty without loss of dignity, and in return ask a 
service of a friend, may I not?"
"Such is the custom of my country. Cappen Varra thanks you, magician."
"Tapster! Your best dinner for my guest, and all he can drink tonight!"
"For such liberal guesting I'll not haggle about the service," Cappen Varra 
said, and set to the smoking dishes brought before him. As he ate, Lythande drew 
from the folds of his robe a small pouch containing a quantity of sweet - 
smelling herbs, rolled them into a blue - gray leaf, and touched his ring to 
spark the roll alight. He drew on the smoke, which drifted up sweet and grayish.
"As for the service, it is nothing so great; tell me all you know of this other 
wizard who wears the blue star. I know of none other of my order south of 
Azehur, and I would be certain you did not see me, nor my wraith."
Cappen Varra sucked at a marrow - bone and wiped his fingers fastidiously on the 
tray - cloth beneath the meats. He bit into a ginger - fruit before replying.
"Not you, wizard, nor your fetch or doppelganger; this one had shoulders 
brawnier by half, and he wore no sword, but two daggers cross - girt astride his 
hips. His beard was black; and his left hand missing three fingers."
"Us of the Thousand Eyes! Rabben the Half - handed, here in Sanctuary! Where did 
you see him, minstrel?"
"I saw him crossing the bazaar; but he bought noth­ing that I saw. And I saw him 
in the Street of Red Lanterns, talking to a woman. What service am I to do for 
you, magician?"
"You have done it." Lythande gave silver to the tavern keeper - so much that the 
surly man bade Shalpa's cloak cover him as he went - and laid another coin, gold 
this time, beside the borrowed lute.
"Redeem your harp; that one will do your voice no boon." But when the minstrel 
raised his head in thanks, the magician had gone unseen into the shadows.
Pocketing the gold, the minstrel asked, "How did he know that? And how did he go 
out?"
"Shalpa the swift alone knows," the tapster said. "Flew out by the smoke - hole 
in the chimney, for all I ken! That one needs not the night - dark cloak of 
Shalpa to cover him, for he has one of his own. He paid for your drinks, good 
sir; what will you have?" And Cappen Varra proceeded to get very drunk, that 
being the wisest thing to do when one becomes entangled un­awares in the private 
affairs of a wizard.
Outside in the street, Lythande paused to consider. Rabben the Half - handed was 
no friend; yet there was no reason his presence in Sanctuary must deal with 
Lythande, or personal revenge. If it were business concerned with the Order of 
the Blue Star, if Lythande must lend Rabben aid, or the Half - handed had been 
sent to summon all the members of the Order, the star they both wore would have 
given warning.
Yet it would do no harm to make certain. Walking swiftly, the magician had 
reached a line of old stables behind the governor's palace. There was silence 
and secrecy for magic. Lythande stepped into one of the little side alleys, 
drawing up the magician's cloak until no light remained, slowly withdrawing 
farther and far­ther into the silence until nothing remained anywhere in the 
world - anywhere in the universe but the light of the blue star ever glowing in 
front. Lythande remem­bered how it had been set there, and at what cost - the 
price an Adept paid for power.
The blue glow gathered, fulminated in many - colored patterns, pulsing and 
glowing, until Lythande stood within the light; and there, in the Place That Is 
Not, seated upon a throne carved apparently from Sap­phire, was the Master of 
the Star.
"Greetings to you, fellow star, star - born, shyrya." The terms of endearment 
could mean fellow, compan­ion, brother, sister, beloved, equal, pilgrim; its 
literal meaning was sharer of starlight. "What brings you into the Pilgrim Place 
this night from afar?"
"The need for knowledge, star - sharer. Have you sent one to seek me out in 
Sanctuary?"
"Not so, shyryu. All is well in the Temple of the Starsharers; you have not yet 
been summoned; the hour is not yet come."
For every Adept of the Blue Star knows; it is one of the prices of power. At the 
world's end, when all the doings of mankind and mortals are done, the last to 
fall under the assault of Chaos will be the Temple of the Star; and then, in the 
Place That Is Not, the Master of the Star will summon all of the Pilgrim Adepts 
from the farthest corners of the world, to fight with all their magic against 
Chaos; but until that day, they have such freedom as will best strengthen their 
powers. The Master of the Star repeated, reassuringly, "The hour has not come. 
You are free to walk as you will in the world."
The blue glow faded, and Lythande stood shivering. So Rabben had not been sent 
in that final summoning. Yet the end and Chaos might well be at hand for 
Lythande before the hour appointed, if Rabben the Half - handed had his way.
It was a fair test of strength, ordained by our masters. Rabben should bear me 
no ill - will. . . . Rabben's pres­ence in Sanctuary need not have to do with 
Lythande. He might be here upon his lawful occasions - if any­thing of Rabben's 
could be said to be lawful; for it was only upon the last day of all that the 
Pilgrim Adepts were pledged to fight upon the side of Law against Chaos. And 
Rabben had not chosen to do so before then.
Caution would be needed, and yet Lythande knew that Rabben was near. . . .
South and east of the governor's palace, there is a little triangular park, 
across from the Street of Tem­ples. By day the graveled walks and turns of 
shrubbery are given over to predicants and priests who find not enough worship 
or offerings for their liking; by night the place is the haunt of women who 
worship no goddess except She of the filled purse and the empty womb. And for 
both reasons the place is called, in irony, the Promise of Heaven; in Sanctuary, 
as elsewhere, it is well known that those who promise do not always perform.
Lythande, who frequented neither women nor priests as a usual thing, did not 
often walk here. The park seemed deserted; the evil winds had begun to blow, 
whipping bushes and shrubbery into the shapes of strange beasts performing 
unnatural acts; and moaning weirdly around the walls and eaves of the Temples 
across the street, the wind that was said in Sanctuary to be the moaning of 
Azyuna in Vashanka's bed. Lythande moved swiftly, skirting the darkness of the 
paths. And then a woman's scream rent the air.
From the shadows Lythande could see the frail form of a young girl in a torn and 
ragged dress; she was barefoot and her ear was bleeding where one jeweled 
earring had been torn from the lobe. She was strug­gling in the iron grip of a 
huge burly black - bearded man, and the first thing Lythande saw was the hand 
gripped around the girl's thin, bony wrist, dragging her; two fingers missing 
and the other cut away to the first joint. Only then - when it was no longer 
needed -  did Lythande see the blue star between the black bristling brows, the 
cat - yellow eyes of Rabben the Half - handed!
Lythande knew him of old, from the Temple of the Star. Even then Rabben had been 
a vicious man, his lecheries notorious. Why, Lythande wondered, had the Masters 
not demanded that he renounce them as the price of his power? Lythande's lips 
tightened in a mirthless grimace; so notorious had been Rabben's lecheries that 
if he renounced them, everyone would know the Secret of his Power.
For the powers of an Adept of the Blue Star de­pended upon a secret. As in the 
old legend of the giant who kept his heart in a secret place outside his body, 
and with it his immortality, so the Adept of the Blue Star poured all his 
psychic force into a single Secret; and the one who discovered the Secret would 
acquire all of that Adept's power. So Rabben's Secret must be something else . . 
. Lythande did not specu­late on it.
The girl cried out pitifully as Rabben jerked at her wrist; as the burly 
magician's star began to glow, she thrust her free hand over her eyes to shield 
them from it. Without fully intending to intervene, Lythande stepped from the 
shadows, and the rich voice that had made the prentice - magicians in the outer 
court of the Blue Star call Lythande "minstrel" rather than "magi­cian," rang 
out:
"By Shipri the All - Mother, release that woman!"
Rabben whirled. "By the nine - hundred - and - ninety, - ninth eye of Us! 
Lythande!"
"Are there not enough women in the Street of Red Lanterns, that you must 
mishandle girl - children in the Street of Temples?" For Lythande could see how 
young she was, the thin aims and childish legs and ankles, the breasts not yet 
full - formed beneath the dirty, torn tunic.
Rabben turned on Lythande and sneered, "You were always squeamish, shyryu. No 
woman walks here unless she is for sale. Do you want her for yourself? Have you 
tired of your fat madame in the Aphrodisia House?"
"You will not take her name into your mouth, shyryu!"
"So tender for the honor of a harlot?"
Lythande ignored that. "Let that girl go, or stand to my challenge."
Rabben's star shot lightning; he shoved the girl to one side. She fell nerveless 
to the pavement and lay without moving. "She'll stay there until we've done. Did 
you think she could run away while we fought? Come to think of it, I never did 
see you with a woman, Lythande - is that your Secret, Lythande, that you've no 
use for women?"
Lythande maintained an impassive face; but what­ever came, Rabben must not be 
allowed to pursue that line. "You may couple like an animal in the streets of 
Sanctuary, Rabben, but I do not. Will you yield her up, or fight?"
"Perhaps I should yield her to you; this is unheard of, that Lythande should 
fight in the streets over a woman! You see, I know your habits well, Lythande!"
Damnation of Vashanka! Now indeed I shall have to fight for the girl!
Lythande's rapier snicked from its scabbard and thrust at Rabben as if of its 
own will.
"Ha! Do you think Rabben fights street - brawls with the sword like any 
mercenary?" Lythande's sword - tip exploded in the blue star - glow, and became 
a shim­mering snake, twisting back on itself to climb past the hilt, fangs 
dripping venom as it sought to coil around Lythande's fist. Lythande's own star 
blazed. The sword was metal again but twisted and useless, in the shape of the 
snake it had been, coiling back toward the scabbard. Enraged, Lythande jerked 
free of the twisted metal, sent a spitting rain of fire in Rabben's direc­tion. 
Quickly the huge Adept covered himself in fog, and the fire - spray extinguished 
itself. Somewhere out­side consciousness Lythande was aware of a crowd 
gathering; not twice in a lifetime did two Adepts of the Blue Star battle by 
sorcery in the streets of Sanctu­ary. The blaze of the stars, blazing from each 
magi­cian's brow, raged lightnings in the square.
On a howling wind came little torches ravening, that flickered and whipped at 
Lythande; they touched the tall form of the magician and vanished. Then a wild 
whirlwind sent trees lashing, leaves swirling bare from branches, and battered 
Rabben to his knees. Lythande was bored; this must be finished quickly. Not one 
of the goggling onlookers in the crowd knew afterward what had been done, but 
Rabben bent, slowly, slowly, forced inch by inch down and down, to his knees, to 
all fours, prone, pressing and grinding his face farther and farther into the 
dust, rocking back and forth, pressing harder and harder into the sand. . . .
Lythande turned and lifted the girl. She stared in disbelief at the burly 
sorcerer grinding his black beard frantically into the dirt.
"What did you - "
"Never mind - let's get out of here. The spell will not hold him long, and when 
he wakes from it he will be angry." Neutral mockery edged Lythande's voice, and 
the girl could see it, too. Rabben with beard and eyes and blue star covered 
with the dirt and dust - 
She scurried along in the wake of the magician's robe; when they were well away 
from the Promise of Heaven, Lythande halted, so abruptly that the girl stumbled.
"Who are you, girl?"
"My name is Bercy. And yours?"
"A magician's name is not lightly given. In Sanctu­ary they call me Lythande." 
Looking down at the girl, the magician noted, with a pang, that beneath the dirt 
and dishevelment she was very beautiful and very young. "You can go, Bercy. He 
will not touch you again; I have bested him fairly upon challenge."
She flung herself on to Lythande's shoulder, cling­ing. "Don't send me away!" 
she begged, clutching, eyes filled with adoration. Lythande scowled.
Predictable, of course, Bercy believed, and who in Sanctuary would have 
disbelieved, that the duel had been fought for the girl as prize, and she was 
ready to give herself to the winner. Lythande made a gesture of protest.
"No - "
The girl narrowed her eyes in pity. "Is it then with you as Rabben said - that 
your secret is that you have been deprived of manhood?" But beyond the pity was 
a delicious flicker of amusement - what a tidbit of gossip! A juicy bit for the 
Streets of Women.
"Silence!" Lythande's glance was imperative. "Come."
She followed along the twisting streets that led into the Street of Red 
Lanterns. Lythande strode with con­fidence, now, past the House of Mermaids, 
where, it was said, delights as exotic as the name promised were to be found; 
past the House of Whips, shunned by all except those who refused to go 
elsewhere; and at last, beneath the face of the Green Lady as she was wor­shiped 
far away and beyond Ranke, the Aphrodisia House.
Bercy looked around, eyes wide, at the pillared lobby, the brilliance of a 
hundred lanterns, the exqui­sitely dressed women lounging on cushions till they 
were summoned. They were finely dressed and be - jeweled - Myrtis knew her 
trade, and how to present her wares - and Lythande guessed that the ragged 
Bercy's glance was one of envy; she had probably sold herself in the bazaars for 
a few coppers or for a loaf of bread, since she was old enough. Yet somehow, 
like flowers covering a dung heap, she had kept an exqui­site fresh beauty, all 
gold and white, flowerlike. Even ragged and half - starved, she touched 
Lythande's heart.
"Bercy, have you eaten today?"
"No, master."
Lythande summoned the huge eunuch Jiro, whose business it was to conduct the 
favored customers to the chambers of their chosen women, and throw out the 
drunks and abusive customers into the street. He came - huge - bellied, naked 
except for a skimpy loin­cloth and a dozen rings in his ear - he had once had a 
lover who was an earring - seller and had used him to display her wares.
"How may we serve the magician Lythande?"
The women on the couches and cushions were twit­tering at one another in 
surprise and dismay, and Lythande could almost hear their thoughts;
None of us has been able to attract or seduce the great magician, and this 
ragged street wench has caught his eyes? And, being women, Lythande knew they 
could see the unclouded beauty that shone through the girl's rags.
"Is Madame Myrtis available, Jiro?"
"She's sleeping, O great wizard, but for you she's given orders she's to be 
waked at any hour. Is this - " no one alive can be quite so supercilious as the 
chief eunuch of a fashionable brothel - "yours, Lythande, or a gift for my 
madame?"
"Both, perhaps. Give her something to eat and find her a place to spend the 
night."
"And a bath, magician? She has fleas enough to louse a floorful of cushions!"
"A bath, certainly, and a bath - woman with scents and oils," Lythande said, 
"and something in the na­ture of a whole garment."
"Leave it to me," said Jiro expansively, and Bercy looked at Lythande in dread, 
but went when the magi­cian gestured to her to go. As Jiro took her away, 
Lythande saw Myrtis standing in the doorway; a heavy woman, no longer young, but 
with the frozen beauty of a spell. Through the perfect spelled features, her 
eyes were warm and welcoming as she smiled at Lythande.
"My dear, I had not expected to see you. Is that yours?" She moved her head 
toward the door through which Jiro had conducted the frightened Bercy. "She'll 
probably run away, you know, once you take your eyes off her."
"I wish I thought so, Myrtis. But no such luck, I fear."
"You had better tell me the whole story," Myrtis said, and listened to 
Lythande's brief, succinct account of the affair.
"And if you laugh, Myrtis, I take back my spell and leave your gray hairs and 
wrinkles open to the mock­ery of everyone in Sanctuary!"
But Myrtis had known Lythande too long to take that threat very seriously. "So 
the maiden you rescued is all maddened with desire for the love of Lythande!" 
She chuckled. "It is like an old ballad, indeed!"
"But what am I to do, Myrtis? By the paps of Shipri the All - mother, this is a 
dilemma!"
"Take her into your confidence and tell her why your love cannot be hers," 
Myrtis said.
Lythande frowned. "You hold my Secret, since I had no choice; you knew me before 
I was made magi­cian, or bore the Blue Star - "
"And before I was a harlot," Myrtis agreed.
"But if I make this girl feel like a fool for loving me, she will hate me as 
much as she loves; and I cannot confide in anyone I cannot trust with my life 
and my power. All I have is yours, Myrtis, because of that past we shared. And 
that includes my power, if you ever should need it. But I cannot entrust it to 
this
girl."
"Still she owes you something, for delivering her out of the hands of Rabben."
Lythande said, "I will think about it; and now make haste to bring me food, for 
I am hungry and athirst." Taken to a private room, Lythande ate and drank, 
served by Myrtis' own hands. And Myrtis said, "I could never have sworn your vow 
- to eat and drink in the sight of no man!"
"If you sought the power of a magician, you would keep it well enough," said 
Lythande. "I am seldom tempted now to break it; I fear only lest I break it 
unawares; I cannot drink in a tavern lest among the women there might be some 
one of those strange men who find diversion in putting on the garments of a 
female; even here I will not eat or drink among your women, for that reason. All 
power depends on the vows and the secret."
"Then I cannot aid you," Myrtis said, "but you are not bound to speak truth to 
her; tell her you have vowed to live without women."
"I may do that," Lythande said, and finished the food, scowling.
Later Bercy was brought in, wide - eyed, enthralled by her fine gown and her 
freshly washed hair, softly curling about her pink - and - white face and the 
sweet scent of bath oils and perfumes that hung about her.
"The girls here wear such pretty clothes, and one of them told me they could eat 
twice a day if they wished! Am I pretty enough, do you think, that Madame Myrtis 
would have me here?"
"If that is what you wish. You are more than beautiful."
Bercy said boldly, "I would rather belong to you, magician," and flung herself 
again on Lythande, her hands clutching and clinging, dragging the lean face down 
to hers. Lythande, who rarely touched anything living, held her gently, trying 
not to reveal conster­nation.
"Bercy, child, this is only a fancy. It will pass."
"No," she wept. "I love you, I want only you!"
And then, unmistakably, along the magician's nerves, Lythande felt that little 
ripple, that warning thrill of tension which said: spell casting is in use. Not 
against Lythande. That could have been countered. But some­where within the 
room.
Here, in the Aphrodisia House? Myrtis, Lythande knew, could be trusted with 
life, reputation, fortune, the magical power of the Blue Star itself; she had 
been tested before this. Had she altered enough to turn betrayer, it would have 
been apparent in her aura when Lythande came near.
That left only the girl, who was clinging and whim­pering; "I will die if you do 
not love me! I will die! Tell me it is not true, Lythande, that you are unable 
to love! Tell me it is an evil lie that magicians are emas­culated, incapable of 
loving woman . . ."
"That is certainly an evil lie," Lythande agreed gravely. "I give you my solemn 
assurance that I have never been emasculated." But Lythande's nerves tin­gled as 
the words were spoken. A magician might lie, and most of them did. Lythande 
would lie as readily as any other, in a good cause. But the law of the Blue Star 
was this: when questioned directly on a matter bearing directly on the Secret, 
the Adept might not tell a direct lie. And Bercy, unknowing, was only one 
question away from the fatal one hiding the Secret.
With a mighty effort, Lythande's magic wrenched at the very fabric of Time 
itself; the girl stood motion­less, aware of no lapse, as Lythande stepped away 
far enough to read her aura. And yes, there within the traces of that vibrating 
field, was the shadow of the Blue Star. Rabben's; overpowering her will.
Rabben. Rabben the Half - handed, who had set his will on the girl, who had 
staged and contrived the whole thing, including the encounter where the girl had 
needed rescue; put the girl under a spell to attract and bespell Lythande.
The law of the Blue Star forbade one Adept of the Star to kill another; for all 
would be needed to fight side by side, on the last day, against Chaos. Yet if 
one Adept could prise forth the secret of another's power . . . then the 
powerless one was not needed against Chaos and could be killed.
What could be done now? Kill the girl? Rabben would take that, top, as an 
answer: Bercy had been so bespelled as to be irresistible to any man; if 
Lythande sent her away untouched, Rabben would know that Lythande's secret lay 
in that area and would never rest in his attempts to uncover it. For if Lythande 
was untouched by this sex - spell to make Bercy irresistible, then Lythande was 
a eunuch, or a homosexual, or ... sweating, Lythande dared not even think beyond 
that. The Secret was safe only if never questioned. It would not be read in the 
aura; but one simple question, and all was ended.
/ should kill her, Lythande thought. For now I am fighting, not for my magic 
alone, but for my secret and for my life. For surely, with my power gone, Rabben 
would lose no time in making an end of me, in revenge for the loss of half a 
hand.
The girl was still motionless, entranced. How easily she could be killed! Then 
Lythande recalled an old fairy - tale, which might be used to save the Secret of 
the Star.
The light flickered as Time returned to the cham­ber. Bercy was still clinging 
and weeping, unaware of the lapse; Lythande had resolved what to do, and the 
girl felt Lythande's arms enfolding her, and the magi­cian's kiss on her 
welcoming mouth.
"You must love me or I shall die!" Bercy wept.
Lythande said, "You shall be mine." The soft neutral voice was very gentle. "But 
even a magician is vulner­able in love, and I must protect myself. A place shall 
be made ready for us without light or sound save for what I provide with my 
magic; and you must swear that you will not seek to see or to touch me except by 
that magical light. Will you swear it by the All - Mother, Bercy? For if you 
swear this, I shall love you as no woman has ever been loved before."
Trembling, she whispered, "I swear." And Lythande's heart went out in pity, for 
Rabben had used her ruth­lessly; so that she burned alive with her unslaked and 
bewitched love for the magician, that she was all caught up in her passion for 
Lythande. Painfully, Lythande thought; if she had only loved me, without the 
spell; then I could have loved. . . .
Would that I could trust her with my secret! But she is only Rabben's tool; her 
love for me is his doing, and none of her own will . . . and not real . . . And 
so everything which would pass between them now must be only a drama staged for 
Rabben.
"I shall make all ready for you with my magic."
Lythande went and confided to Myrtis what was needed; the woman began to laugh, 
but a single glance at Lythande's bleak face stopped her cold. She had known 
Lythande since long before the blue star was set between those eyes; and she 
kept the Secret for love of Lythande. It wrung her heart to see one she loved in 
the grip of such suffering. So she said, "All will be prepared. Shall I give her 
a drug in her wine, to weaken her will, that you may the more readily throw a 
glamour upon her?"
Lythande's voice held a terrible bitterness. "Rabben has done that already for 
us, when he put a spell upon her to love me."
"You would have it otherwise?" Myrtis asked, hesitating.
"All the gods of Sanctuary - they laugh at me! All - Mother, help me! But I 
would have it otherwise; I could love her, if she were not Rabben's tool."
When all was prepared, Lythande entered the dark­ened room. There was no light 
but the light of the Blue Star. The girl lay on a bed, stretching up her arms to 
the magician with exalted abandon.
"Come to me, come to me, my love!"
"Soon," said Lythande, sitting beside her, stroking her hair with a tenderness 
even Myrtis would never have guessed. "I will sing to you a love - song of my 
people, far away."
She writhed in erotic ecstasy. "All you do is good to me, my love, my magician!"
Lythande felt the blankness of utter despair. She was beautiful, and she was in 
love. She lay in a bed spread for the two of them, and they were separated by 
the breadth of the world. The magician could not endure it.
Lythande sang, in that rich and beautiful voice; a voice lovelier than any 
spell;
Half the night is spent; and the crown of moonlight Fades, and now the crown of 
the stars is paling; Yields the sky reluctant to coming morning; Still I lie 
lonely.
Lythande could see tears on Bercy's cheeks. / will love you as no woman has ever 
been loved.
Between the girl on the bed, and the motionless form of the magician, as the 
magician's robe fell heav­ily to the floor, a wraith - form grew, the very 
wraith and fetch, at first, of Lythande, tall and lean, with blazing eyes and a 
star between its brows and a body white and unscarred; the form of the magician, 
but this one triumphant in virility, advancing on the mo­tionless woman, 
waiting. Her mind fluttered away in arousal, was caught, captured, bespelled. 
Lythande let her see the image for a moment; she could not see the true Lythande 
behind; then, as her eyes closed in ecstatic awareness of the touch, Lythande 
smoothed light fingers over her closed eyes.
"See - what I bid you to see! "Hear - what I bid you hear! "Feel - only what I 
bid you feel, Bercy!"
And now she was wholly under the spell of the wraith. Unmoving, stony - eyed, 
Lythande watched as her lips closed on emptiness and she kissed invisible lips; 
and moment by moment Lythande knew what touched her, what caressed her. Rapt and 
ravished by illusion, that brought her again and again to the heights of 
ecstasy, till she cried out in abandonment. Only to Lythande that cry was 
bitter; for she cried out not to Lythande but to the man - wraith who possessed 
her.
At last she lay all but unconscious, satiated; and Lythande watched in agony. 
When she opened her eyes again, Lythande was looking down at her, sorrow­fully.
Bercy stretched up languid arms. "Truly, my be­loved, you have loved me as no 
woman has ever been loved before."
For the first and last time, Lythande bent over her and pressed her lips in a 
long, infinitely tender kiss. "Sleep, my darling."
And as she sank into ecstatic, exhausted sleep, Lythande wept.
Long before she woke, Lythande stood, girt for travel, in the little room 
belonging to Myrtis.
"The spell will hold. She will make all haste to carry her tale to Rabben - the 
tale of Lythande, the incom­parable lover! Of Lythande, of untiring virility, 
who can love a maiden into exhaustion!" The rich voice of Lythande was harsh 
with bitterness.
"And long before you return to Sanctuary, once freed of the spell, she will have 
forgotten you in many other lovers," Myrtis agreed. "It is better and safer that 
it should be so."
"True." But Lythande's voice broke. "Take care of her, Myrtis. Be kind to her."
"I swear it, Lythande."
"If only she could have loved me" - the magician broke and sobbed again for a 
moment; Myrtis looked away, wrung with pain, knowing not what comfort to offer.
"If only she could have loved me as I am, freed of Rabben's spell! Loved me 
without pretense! But I feared I could not master the spell Rabben had put on 
her . . . nor trust her not to betray me, knowing . . .
Myrtis put her plump arms around Lythande, ten­derly.
"Do you regret?"
The question was ambiguous. It might have meant: Do you regret that you did not 
kill the girl? Or even: Do you regret your oath and the secret you must bear to 
the last day? Lythande chose to answer the last.
"Regret? How can I regret? One day I shall fight against Chaos with all of my 
order; even at the side of Rabben, if he lives unmurdered as long as that. And 
that alone must justify my existence and my Secret. But now I must leave 
Sanctuary, and who knows when the chances of the world will bring me this way 
again? Kiss me farewell, my sister."
Myrtis stood on tiptoe. Her lips met the lips of the magician.
"Until we meet again, Lythande. May She attend and guard you forever. Farewell, 
my beloved, my sister."
Then, the magician Lythande girded on her sword, and went silently and by unseen 
ways out of the city of Sanctuary, just as the dawn was breaking. And on her 
forehead the glow of the Blue Star was dimmed by the rising sun. Never once did 
she look back.
(1979)
 
To Keep the Oath
 
The red light lingered on the hills; two of the four small moons were in the 
sky, green Idriel near to setting, and the tiny crescent of Mormallor, ivory - 
pale, near the zenith. The night would be dark. Kindra n'ha Mhari did not, at 
first, see anything strange about the little town. She was too grateful to have 
reached it before sunset - shelter against the rain swept chill of a Darkovan 
night, a bed to sleep in after four days of traveling, a cup of wine before she 
slept.
But slowly she began to realize that there was some­thing wrong. Normally, at 
this hour, the women would be going back and forth in the streets, gossiping 
with neighbors, marketing for the evening meal, while their children played and 
squabbled in the street. But to­night there was not a single woman in the 
street, nor a single child.
What was wrong? Frowning, she rode along the main street toward the inn. She was 
hungry and weary.
She had left Dalereuth many days before with a companion, bound for Neskaya 
Guild - house. But un­known to either of them, her companion had been pregnant; 
she had fallen sick of a fever, and in Thendara Guild - house she had miscarried 
and still lay there, very ill. Kindra had gone alone to Neskaya; but she had 
turned aside three days' ride to carry a message to the sick woman's oath - 
mother. She had found her in a village in the hills, working to help a group of 
women set up a small dairy.
Kindra was not afraid of traveling alone; she had journeyed in these hills at 
all seasons and in all weathers. But her provisions were beginning to run low. 
Fortunately, the innkeeper was an old acquaintance; she had little money with 
her, because her journey had been so unexpectedly prolonged, but old Jorik would 
feed her and her horse, give her a bed for the night, and trust her to send 
money to pay for it -  knowing that if she did not, or could not, her Guild - 
house would pay, for the honor of the Guild.
The man who took her horse in the stable had known her for many years, too. He 
scowled as she alighted. "I don't know where we shall stable your horse, and 
that's certain, mestra, with all these strange horses here . . . Will she share 
a box stall without kicking, do you suppose? Or shall I tie her loose at the 
end?" Kindra noticed that the stable was crammed with horses, two dozen of them 
and more. Instead of a lonely village inn, it looked like Neskaya on market - 
day!
"Did you meet with any riders on the road, mestra?"
"No, none," Kindra said, frowning a little. "All the horses in the Kilghard 
Hills seem to be here in your stable - what is it, a royal visit? What is the 
matter with you? You keep looking over your shoulder as if you expect to find 
your master there with a stick to beat you - where is old Jorik, why is he not 
here to greet his guests?"
"Why, mestra, old Jorik's dead," the old man said, "and Dame Janella is trying 
to manage the inn alone with young Annelys and Marga." Dead? Gods preserve us," 
Kindra said. "What hap­pened?"
"It was those bandits, mestra, Scarface's gang; they came here and cut Jorik 
down with his apron still on," said the old groom. "Made havoc in the town, 
broke all the ale - pots, and when the menfolk drove 'em off with pitchforks, 
they swore they'd be back and fire the town! So Dame Janella and the elders put 
the cap round and raised copper to hire Brydar of Fen Hills and all his men to 
come and defend us when they come back; and here Brydar's men have been ever 
since, mestra, quarrelling and drinking and casting eyes on the women until the 
townfolk are ready to say the remedy's worse than the sickness! But go in, go 
in, mestra, Janella's ready to welcome you."
Plump Janella looked paler and thinner than Kindra had ever seen her. She 
greeted Kindra with unaccus­tomed warmth. Under ordinary conditions, she was 
cold to Kindra, as befitted a respectable wife in the presence of a member of 
the Amazon Guild; now, Kindra supposed, she was learning that an innkeeper could 
not afford to alienate a customer. Jorik, Kindra knew, had not approved of the 
Free Amazons either; but he had learned from experience that they were quiet 
guests who kept to themselves, caused no trou­ble, did not get drunk and break 
bar - stools and ale - pots, and paid their reckoning promptly. A guests's 
reputation, Kindra thought wryly, does not tarnish the color of his money.
"You have heard, good mestra? Those wicked men, Scarface's fellows, they cut my 
good man down, and for nothing - just because he flung an ale - pot at one of 
them who laid rough hands on my little girl, and Annelys not fifteen yet! 
Monsters!"
"And they killed him? Shocking!" Kindra murmured, but her pity was for the girl. 
All her life, young Annelys must remember that her father had been killed in 
defending her, because she could not defend herself. Like all the women of the 
Guild, Kindra was sworn to defend herself, to turn to no man for protection. She 
had been a member of the Guild for half her lifetime; it seemed shocking to her 
that a man should die de­fending a girl from advances she should have known how 
to ward off herself.
"Ah, you don't know what it's like, mestra, being alone without the goodman. 
Living alone as you do, you can't imagine!"
"Well, you have daughters to help you," Kindra said, and Janella shook her head 
and mourned. "But they can't come out among all those rough men, they are only 
little girls!"
"It will do them good to learn something of the world and its ways," Kindra 
said, but the woman sighed. "I wouldn't like them to learn too much of that."
"Then, I suppose, you must get you another hus­band," Kindra said, knowing that 
there was simply no way she and Janella could communicate. "But indeed I am 
sorry for your grief. Jorik was a good man."
"You can't imagine how good, mestra," Janella said plaintively. "You women of 
the Guild, you call yourselves free women, only it seems to me I have always 
been free, until now, when I must watch myself night and day, lest someone get 
the wrong idea about a woman alone. Only the other day, one of Brydar's men said 
to me - and that's another thing, these men of Brydar's. Eating us out of house 
and home, and just look, mestra, no room in the stable for the horses of our 
paying customers, with half the village keeping their horses here against 
bandits, and those hired swords drinking up my good old man's beer day after day 
- " Abruptly she recalled her duties as landlord. "But come into the common - 
room, mestra, warm yourself, and I'll bring you some supper; we have a roast 
haunch of chervine. Or would you fancy something lighter, rabbithorn stewed with 
mushrooms, perhaps? We're crowded, yes, but there's the little room at the head 
of the stairs, you can have that to yourself, a room fit for a fine lady, indeed 
Lady Hastur slept here in that very bed, a few years gone. Lilla! Lilla! Where's 
that simpleminded wench gone? When I took her in, her mother told me she was 
lack - witted, but she has wits enough to hang about talking to that young hired 
sword, Zandru scratch them all! Lilla! Hurry now, show the good woman her room, 
fetch her wash - water, see to her saddlebags!"
Later, Kindra went down to the common - room. Like all Guild - women, she had 
learned to be discreet when traveling alone; a solitary woman was prey to 
ques­tions, at least, so they usually journeyed in pairs. This subjected them to 
raised eyebrows and occasional dirty speculations, but warded off the less 
palatable approaches to which a lone woman traveling on Dark­over was subject. 
Of course, any woman of the Guild could protect herself if it went past rude 
words, but that could cause trouble for all the Guild. It was better to conduct 
oneself in a way that minimized the possi­bility of trouble. So Kindra sat alone 
in a tiny corner near the fireplace, kept her hood drawn around her face - she 
was neither young nor particularly pretty -  sipped her wine and warmed her 
feet, and did nothing to attract anyone's attention. It occurred to her that at 
this moment she, who called herself a Free Amazon, was considerably less 
constrained than Janella's young daughters, going back and forth, protected by 
their family's roof and their mother's presence.
She finished her meal - she had chosen the stewed rabbithorn - and called for a 
second glass of wine, too weary to climb the stairs to her chamber and too tired 
to sleep if she did.
Some of Brydar's hired swords were sitting around a long table at the other end 
of the room, drinking and playing dice. They were a mixed crew; Kindra knew none 
of them, but she had met Brydar himself a few times, and had even hired out with 
him, once, to guard a merchant caravan across the desert to the Dry Towns. She 
nodded courteously to him, and he sa­luted her, but paid her no further 
attention; he knew her well enough to know that she would not welcome even 
polite conversation when she was in a roomful of strangers.
One of the younger mercenaries, a young man, tall, beardless and weedy, ginger 
hair cut close to his head, rose and came toward her. Kindra braced herself for 
the inevitable. If she had been with two or three other Guild - women, she would 
have welcomed harmless com­panionship, a drink together and talk about the 
chances of the road, but a lone Amazon simply did not drink with men in public 
taverns, and, damn it, Brydar knew it as well as she did.
One of the older mercenaries must have been hav­ing some fun with the green boy, 
needling him to prove his manhood by approaching the Amazon, amus­ing themselves 
by enjoying the rebuff he'd inevitably get.
One of the men looked up and made a remark Kindra didn't hear. The boy snarled 
something, a hand to his dagger. "Watch yourself, you - !" He spoke a foulness. 
Then he came to Kindra's table and said, in a soft, husky voice, "A good evening 
to you, honor­able mistress."
Startled at the courteous phrase, but still wary, Kindra said, "And to you, 
young sir."
"May I offer you a tankard of wine?"
"I have had enough to drink," Kindra said, "but I thank you for the kind offer." 
Something faintly out of key, almost effeminate, in the youth's bearing, alerted 
her; his proposition, then, would not be the usual thing. Most people knew that 
Free Amazons took lovers if and when they chose, and all too many men 
interpreted that to mean that any Amazon could be had, at any time. Kindra was 
an expert at turning covert advances aside without ever letting it come to 
question or refusal; with ruder approaches, she man­aged with scant courtesy. 
But that wasn't what this youngster wanted; she knew when a man was looking at 
her with desire, whether he put it into words or not, and although there was 
certainly interest in this young man's face, it wasn't sexual interest! What did 
he want with her, then?
"May I - may I sit here and talk to you for a mo­ment, honorable dame?"
Rudeness she could have managed. This excessive courtesy was a puzzle. Were they 
simply making game of a woman hater, wagering he would not have the courage to 
talk to her? She said neutrally, "This is a public room; the chairs are not 
mine. Sit where you like."
Ill at ease, the boy took a seat. He was young indeed. He was still beardless, 
but his hands were callused and hard, and there was a long - healed scar on one 
cheek; he was not as young as she thought.
"You are a Free Amazon, mestra?" He used the common, and rather offensive, term; 
but she did not hold it against him. Many knew no other name.
"I am," she said, "but we would rather say: I am of the oath - bound - " The 
word she used was Comhi - Letzis - 'A Renunciate of the Sisterhood of Freed 
Women."
"May I ask - without giving offense - why the name Renunciate, mestra?"
Actually, Kindra welcomed a chance to explain. "Because, sir, in return for our 
freedom as women of the Guild, we swear an oath renouncing those privi­leges 
that we might have by choosing to belong to some man. If we renounce the 
disabilities of being property and chattel, we must renounce, also, what­ever 
benefits there may be; so that no man can accuse us of trying to have the best 
of both choices."
He said gravely, "That seems to me an honorable choice. I have never yet met a 
Renunciate. Tell me, mestra - " His voice suddenly cracked high. "I suppose you 
know the slanders that are spoken of you - tell me, how does any woman have the 
courage to join the Guild, knowing what will be said of her?"
"I suppose," Kindra said quietly, "for some women, a time comes when they think 
that there are worse things than being the subject of public slanders. It was so 
with me."
He thought that over for a moment, frowning. "I have never seen a Free-er - a 
Renunciate traveling alone before. Do you not usually travel in pairs, 
hon­orable dame?"
"True. But need knows no mistress," Kindra said, and explained that her 
companion had fallen sick in Thendara.
"And you came so far to bear a message? Is she your bredhis?" the boy asked, 
using the polite word for a woman's freemate or female lover; and because it was 
the polite word he used, not the gutter one, Kindra did not take offense. "No, 
only a comrade."
"I - I would not have dared speak if there had been two of you - "
Kindra laughed. "Why not? Even in twos or threes, we are not dogs to bite 
strangers."
The boy stared at his boots. "I have cause to fear -  women - " he said, almost 
inaudibly. "But you seemed kind. And I suppose, mestra, that whenever you come 
into these hills, where life is so hard for women, you are always seeking out 
wives and daughters who are discontented at home, to recruit them for your 
Guild?"
Would that we might! Kindra thought, with all the old bitterness; but she shook 
her head. "Our charter forbids it," she said. "It is the law that a woman must 
seek us out herself, and formally petition to be al­lowed to join  - us. I am 
not even allowed to tell women of the advantages of the Guild, when they ask. I 
may only tell them of the things they must renounce, by oath." She tightened her 
lips and added, "If we were to do as you say, to seek out discontented wives and 
daughters and lure them away to the Guild, the men would not let any Guild - 
house stand in the Domains, but would burn our houses about our ears." It was 
the old injustice; the women of Darkover had won this concession, the charter of 
the Guild, but so hedged about with restrictions that many women never saw or 
spoke with a Guild - sister.
"I suppose," she said, "that they have found out that we are not whores, so they 
insist that we are all lovers of women, intent on stealing out their wives and 
daughters. We must be, it seems, one evil thing or the other."
"Are there no lovers of women among you, then?"
Kindra shrugged. "Certainly," she said. "You must know that there are some women 
who would rather die than marry; and even with all the restrictions and 
rununciations of the oath, it seems a preferable alter­native. But I assure you 
we are not all so. We are free women - free to be thus or otherwise, at our own 
will." After a moment's thought she added carefully, "And if you have a sister 
you may tell her so from me."
The young man started, and Kindra bit her lip; again she had let her guard down, 
picking up hunches so clearly formed that sometimes her companions ac­cused her 
of having a little of the telepathic gift of the higher castes; laran. Kindra, 
who was, as far as she knew, all commoner and without either noble blood or 
telepathic gift, usually kept herself barricaded; but she had picked up a random 
thought, a bitter thought from somewhere, My sister would not believe ... a 
thought quickly vanished, so quickly that Kindra won­dered if she had imagined 
the whole thing.
The young face across the table twisted into bitter lines.
"There is none, now, I may call my sister."
"I am sorry," Kindra said, puzzled. "To be alone, that is a sorrowful thing. May 
I ask your name?"
The boy hesitated again, and Kindra knew, with that odd intuition, that the real 
name had almost es­caped the taut lips; but he bit it back.
"Brydar's men call me Marco. Don't ask my lin­eage; there is none who will claim 
kin to me now -  thanks to those foul bandits under Scarface." He twisted his 
mouth and spat. "Why do you think I am in this company? For the few coppers 
these village folk can pay? No, mestra. I too am oath - bound. To revenge."
Kindra left the common - room early, but she could not sleep for a long time. 
Something in the young man's voice, his words, had plucked a resonating string 
in her own mind and memory. Why had he questioned her so insistently? Had he a 
sister or kinswoman, perhaps, who had spoken of becoming a Renunciate? Or was 
he, an obvious effeminate, jealous of her be­cause she could escape the role 
ordained by society for her sex and he could not? Did he fantasy, perhaps, some 
such escape from the demands made upon men? Surely not; there were simpler lives 
for men than that of a hired sword! And men had a choice of what lives they 
would live - more choice, anyhow, than most women. Kindra had chosen to become a 
Renunciate, making herself an outcaste among most people in the Domains. Even 
the innkeeper only tolerated her, be­cause she was a regular customer and paid 
well, but he would have equally tolerated a prostitute or a travel­ing juggler, 
and would have had fewer prejudices against either.
Was the youth, she wondered, one of the rumored spies sent out by cones, the 
governing body in Thendara, to trap Renunciates who broke the terms of their 
charter by proselytizing and attempting to recruit women into the Guild? If so, 
at least she had resisted the temptation. She had not even said, though tempted, 
that if Janella were a Renunciate she would have felt competent to run the inn 
by herself, with the help of her daughters.
A few times, in the history of the Guild, men had even tried to infiltrate them 
in disguise. Unmasked, they had met with summary justice, but it had hap­pened 
and might happen again. At that, she thought, he might be convincing enough in 
women's clothes; but not with the scar on his face, or those callused hands. 
Then she laughed in the dark, feeling the cal­luses on her own fingers. Well, if 
he was fool enough to try it, so much the worse for him. Laughing, she fell 
asleep.
Hours later she woke to the sound of hoofbeats, the clash of steel, yells and 
cries outside. Somewhere women were shrieking. Kindra flung on her outer clothes 
and ran downstairs. Brydar was standing in the courtyard, bellowing orders. Over 
the wall of the courtyard she could see a sky reddened with flames. Scarface and 
his bandit crew were loose in the town, it seemed.
"Go, Renwal," Brydar ordered. "Slip behind their rearguard and set their horses 
loose, stampede them, so they must stand to fight, not strike and flee again! 
And since all the good horses are stabled here, one of you must stay and guard 
them lest they strike here for ours ... the rest of you come with me, and have 
your swords at the ready - "
Janella was huddled beneath the overhanging roof of an outbuilding, her 
daughters and serving women like roosting hens around her. "Will you leave us 
all here unguarded, when we have housed you all for seven days and never a penny 
in pay? Scarface and his men are sure to strike here for the horses, and we are 
unprotected, at their mercy - "
Brydar gestured to the boy Marco. "You. Stay and guard horses and women - "
The boy snarled, "No! I joined your crew on the pledge that I should face 
Scarface, steel in hand! It is an affair of honor - do you think I need your 
dirty coppers?"
Beyond the wall all was shrieking confusion. "I have no time to bandy words," 
Brydar said quickly. "Kin­dra - this is no quarrel of yours, but you know me a 
man of my word; stay here and guard the horses and these women, and I will make 
it worth your while!"
"At the mercy of a woman? A woman to guard us? Why not set a mouse to guard a 
lion!" Janella's shrew­ish cry cut him off. The boy Marco urged, eyes blaz­ing, 
"Whatever I have been promised for this foray is yours, mestra, if you free me 
to meet my sworn foe!"
"Go; I'll look after them," Kindra said. It was un­likely Scarface would get 
this far, but it was really no affair of hers; normally she fought beside the 
men, and would have been angry at being left in a post of safety. But Janella's 
cry had put her on her mettle. Marco caught up his sword and hurried to the 
gate, Brydar following him. Kindra watched them go, her mind on her own early 
battles. Some turn of gesture, of phrase, had alerted her. The boy Marco is 
noble, she thought. Perhaps even Cornyn, some bastard of a great lord, perhaps 
even a Hastur. I don't know what he's doing with Brydar's men, but he's no 
ordinary hired sword!
Janella's wailing brought her back to her duty. "Oh!
Oh! Horrible," she howled. "Left here with only a woman to look after us ..."
Kindra said tersely, "Come on!" She gestured. "Help me close that gate!"
"I don't take -  orders from one of you shameless women in breeches - "
"Let the damned gate stay open, then," Kindra said, right out of patience. "Let 
Scarface walk in with­out any trouble. Do you want me to go and invite him, or 
shall we send one of your daughters?"
"Mother!" remonstrated a girl of fifteen, breaking away from Janella's hand. 
"That is no way to speak -  Lilla, Marga, help the good mestra shove this gate 
shut!" She came and joined Kindra, helping to thrust the heavy wooden gate 
tightly into place, pull down the heavy crossbeam. The women were wailing in 
dismay; Kindra singled out one of them, a young girl about six or seven moons 
along in pregnancy, who was huddled in a blanket over her night gear.
"You," she said, "take all the babies and the little children upstairs into the 
strongest chamber, bolt the doors and don't open them unless you hear my voice 
or Janella's." The woman did not move, still sobbing, and Kindra said sharply, 
"Hurry! Don't stand there like a rabbithorn frozen in the snow! Damn you, move, 
or I'll slap you senseless!" She made a menacing ges­ture and the woman started, 
then began to hurry the children up the stairs; she picked up one of the 
littlest ones, hurried the others along with frightened, cluck­ing noises.
Kindra surveyed the rest of the frightened women. Janella was hopeless. She was 
fat and short of breath, and she was staring resentfully at Kindra, furious that 
she had been left in charge of their defense. Further­more, she was trembling on 
the edge of a panic that would infect everyone; but if she had something to do, 
she might calm down. "Janella, go into the kitchen and make up some hot wine 
punch," she said. "The men will want it when they come back, and they'll deserve 
it, too. Then start hunting out some linen for bandages, in case anyone's hurt. 
Don't worry," she added, "they won't get to you while we're here. And take that 
one with you," she added, pointing to the terrified simpleton Lilla, who was 
clinging to Janella's skirt, round - eyed with terror, whimpering. "She'll only 
be in our way.
When Janella had gone, grumbling, the lackwit at her heels, Kindra looked around 
at the sturdy young women who remained.
"Come, all of you, into the stables, and pile heavy bales of hay around the 
horses, so they can't drive the horses over them or stampede them out. No, leave 
the lantern there; if Scarface and his men break through, we'll set a couple of 
bales afire; that will frighten the horses and they might well kick a bandit or 
two to death. Even so, the women can escape while they round up the horses; 
contrary to what you may have heard, most bandits look first for horses and rich 
plunder, and women are not the first item on their list. And none of you have 
jewels or rich garments they would seek to strip from you." Kindra herself knew 
that any man who laid his hand on her, intending rape, would quickly regret it; 
and if she was overpow­ered by numbers, she had been taught ways in which she 
could survive the experience undestroyed; but these women had had no such 
teaching. It was not right to blame them for their fears.
/ could teach them this. But the laws of our charter prevent me and I am bound 
by oath to obey those laws; laws made, not by our own Guild - mothers, but by 
men who fear what we might have to say to their women!
Well, perhaps at least they will find it a matter for pride that they can defend 
their home against invaders! Kindra went to lend her own wiry strength to the 
task of piling up the heavy bales around the horses; the women worked, 
forgetting their fears in hard effort. But one grumbled, just loud enough for 
Kindra to hear, "It's all very well for her! She was trained as a warrior and 
she's used to this kind of work! I'm not!"
It was no time to debate Guild - house ethics; Kindra only asked mildly, "Are 
you proud of the fact that you have not been taught to defend yourself, child?" 
But the girl did not answer, sullenly hauling at her heavy hay - bale.
It was not difficult for Kindra to follow her thought; if it had not been for 
Brydar, each man of the town could have protected each one his own women! Kindra 
thought, in utter disgust, that this was the sort of thinking that laid villages 
in flames, year after year, because no man owed loyalty to another or would 
protect any household but his own! It had taken a threat like Scarface to get 
these village men organized enough to buy the services of a few hired swords, 
and now their women were grumbling because their men could not stand, each at 
his own door, protecting his own woman and hearth!
Once the horses had been barricaded, the women clustered together nervously in 
the courtyard. Even Janella came to the kitchen door to watch. Kindra went to 
the barred gate, her knife loose in its scab­bard. The other girls and women 
stood under the roof of the kitchen, but one young girl, the same who had helped 
Kindra to shut the gate, bent and tucked her skirt resolutely up to her knees, 
then went and brought back a big wood - chopping hatchet and stood with it in 
her hand, taking up a place at the gate beside Kindra.
"Annelys!" Janella called. "Come back here! By me!"
The girl cast a look of contempt at her mother and said, "If any bandit climbs 
these walls, he will not get his hands on me, or on my little sister, without 
facing cold steel. It's not a sword, but I think even in a girl's hands, this 
blade would change his mind in a hurry!" She glanced defiantly at Kindra and 
said, "I am ashamed for all of you, that you would let one lone woman protect 
us! Even a rabbithorn doe protects her kits!"
Kindra gave the girl a companionable grin. "If you have half as much skill with 
that thing as you have guts, little sister, I would rather have you at my back 
than any man. Hold the axe with your hands close together, if the time comes to 
use it, and don't try anything fancy, just take a good hard chop at his legs,, 
just like you were cutting down a tree. The thing is, he won't be expecting it, 
see?"
The night dragged on. The women huddled on hay - bales and boxes, listening with 
apprehension and occa­sional sobs and tears as they heard the clash of swords, 
cries and shouts. Only Annelys stood grimly beside Kindra, clutching her axe. 
After an hour or so, Kindra said, settling herself down on a hay - bale, "You 
needn't clutch it like that, you'll only weary yourself for an attack. Lean it 
against the bale, so you can snatch it up when the need comes."
Annelys asked in an undertone, "How did you know so well what to do? Are all the 
Free Amazons - you call them something else, don't you - how do the Guild - 
women learn? Are they all fighting women and hired swords?"
"No, no, not even many of us," Kindra said. "It is only that I have not many 
other talents; I cannot weave or embroider very well, and my skill at garden­ing 
is only good in the summertime. My own oath - mother is a midwife, that is our 
most respected trade; even those who despise the Renunciates confess that we can 
often save babies alive when the village healer - women fail. She would have 
taught me her profession; but I had no talent for that, either, and I am 
squea­mish about the sight of blood - " She looked down suddenly at her long 
knife, remembering her many battles, and laughed; and Annelys laughed with her, 
a strange sound against the frightened moaning of the other women.
"You are afraid of the sight of blood?"
"It's different," Kindra said. "I can't stand suffering when I can't do anything 
about it, and if a babe is born easily they seldom send for the midwife; we come 
only when matters are desperate. I would rather fight with men, or beasts, than 
for the life of a helpless woman or baby ..."
"I think I would too," said Annelys, and Kindra thought: Now, if I were not 
bound by the laws of the Guild, I could tell her what we are. And this one would 
be a credit to the Sisterhood ...
But her oath held her silent. She sighed and looked at Annelys, frustrated.
She was beginning to think the precautions had been useless, that Scarface's men 
would never come here at all, when there was a shriek from one of the women, and 
Kindra saw the tassel of a coarse knitted cap come up over the wall; then two 
men appeared on top of the wall, knives gripped in their teeth to free their 
hands for climbing.
"So here's where they've hidden it all, women, horses, all of it - " growled 
one. "You go for the horses, I'll take care of - oh, you would," he shouted as 
Kindra ran at him with her knife drawn. He was taller than Kindra; as they 
fought, she could only defend herself, backing step by step toward the stables. 
Where were the men? Why had the bandits been able to get this far? Were they the 
last defense of the town? Behind her, out of the corner of her eye she saw the 
other bandit coming up with his sword; she circled, backing carefully so she 
could face them both.
Then there was a shriek from Annelys, the axe flashed once, and the second 
bandit fell, howling, his leg spouting blood. Kindra's opponent faltered at the 
sound; Kindra brought up her knife and ran him through the shoulder, snatching 
up his knife as it fell from his limp hand. He fell backward, and she leaped on 
top of him.
"Annelys!" she shouted. "You women! Bring thongs, rope, anything to tie him up - 
there may be others - "
Janella came with a clothesline and stood by as Kindra tied the man, then, 
stepping back, looked at the bandit, lying in a pool of his own blood. His leg 
was nearly severed at the knee. He was still breathing, but he was too far gone 
even to moan and while the women stood and looked at him, he died. Janella 
stared at Annelys in horror, as if her young daughter had suddenly sprouted 
another head.
"You killed him," she breathed. "You chopped his leg off!"
"Would you rather he had chopped off mine, mother?" Annelys asked, and bent to 
look at the other bandit. "He is only stabbed through the shoul­der, he'll live 
to be hanged!"
Breathing hard, Kindra straightened, giving the clothesline a final tug. She 
looked at Annelys and said, "You saved my life, little sister."
The girl smiled up at her, excited, her hair coming down and tumbling into her 
eyes. There was a cold sleet beginning to fall in the courtyard; their faces 
were wet. Annelys suddenly flung her arms around Kindra, and the older woman 
hugged her, disregard­ing the mother's troubled face.
"One of our own could not have done better. My thanks, little one!" Damn it, the 
girl had earned her thanks and approval, and if Janella stared at them as if 
Kindra were a wicked seducer of young women, then so much the worse for Janella! 
She let the girl's arm stay around her shoulders as she said, "Listen; I think 
that is the men coming back."
And in a minute they heard Brydar's hail, and they struggled to raise the great 
crossbeam of the gate. His men drove before them more than a dozen good horses, 
and Brydar laughed, saying, "Scarface's men will have no more use for them; so 
we're well paid! I see you women got the last of them?" He looked down at the 
bandit lying in his gore, at the other, tied with Janella's clothesline. "Good 
work, mestra, I'll see you have a share in the booty!"
"The girl helped," Kindra said. "I'd have been dead without her."
"One of them killed my father," the girl said fiercely, "so I have paid my just 
debt, that is all!" She turned to Janella and ordered, "Mother, bring our 
defenders some of that wine punch, at once!"
Brydar's men sat all over the common - room, drink­ing the hot wine gratefully. 
Brydar set down the tan­kard and rubbed his hands over his eyes with a tired
"Whoosh!" He said, "Some of my men are hurt, dame Janella; have any of your 
women skill with leech - craft? We will need bandages, and perhaps some salves 
and herbs. I - " He broke off as one of the men beckoned him urgently from the 
door, and he went at a run.
Annelys brought Kindra a tankard and put it shyly into her hand. Kindra sipped; 
it was not the wine - punch Janella had made, but a clear, fine, golden wine 
from the mountains. Kindra sipped it slowly, knowing the girl had been telling 
her something. She sat across from Kindra, taking a sip now and then of the hot 
wine in her own tankard. They were both reluctant to part.
Damn that fool law that says I cannot tell her of the Sisterhood! She is too 
good for this place and for that fool mother of hers; the idiot Lilla is more 
what her mother needs to help run the inn, and I suppose Janella will marry her 
off to some yokel at once, just to have help in running this place! Honor 
demanded she keep silent. Yet, watching Annelys, thinking of the life the girl 
would lead here, she wondered, troubled, what kind of honor it was, to require 
that she leave a girl like this in a place like this.
Yet she supposed it was a wise law; anyway, it had been made by wiser heads than 
hers. She supposed, otherwise, young girls, glamored for the moment with the 
thought of a life of excitement and adventure, might follow the Sisterhood 
without being fully aware of the hardships and the renunciations that awaited 
them. The name Renunciate was not lightly given; it was not an easy life. And 
considering the way Annelys was looking at her, Annelys might follow her simply 
out of hero - worship. That wouldn't do. She sighed, and said, "Well, the 
excitement is over for tonight, I sup­pose. I must be away to my bed; I have a 
long way to ride tomorrow. Listen to that racket! I didn't know any of Brydar's 
men were seriously hurt - "
"It sounds more like a quarrel than men in pain," Annelys said, listening to the 
shouts and protests. "Are they quarrelling over the spoils?"
Abruptly the door was thrust open and Brydar of Fen Hills came into the room. 
"Mestra, forgive me, you are wearied - "
"Enough," she said, "but after all this hullabaloo I am not like to sleep much; 
what can I do for you?"
"I beg you - will you come? It is the boy - young Marco; he is hurt, badly hurt, 
but he will not let us tend his wounds until he has spoken with you. He says he 
has an urgent message, very urgent, which he must give before he dies. ...
"Avarra's mercy," Kindra said^ shocked. "Is he dying, then?"
"I cannot tell, he will not let us near enough to dress his wound. If he would 
be reasonable and let us care for him - but he is bleeding like a slaughtered 
chervine, and he has threatened to slit the throat of any man who touches him. 
We tried to hold him down and tend him willy-nilly, but it made his wounds bleed 
so sore as he struggled that we dared not wait - will you come, mestra?"
Kindra looked at him with question - she had not thought he would humor any man 
of his band so. Brydar said defensively, "The lad is nothing to me; not foster - 
brother, kinsman, nor even friend. But he fought at my side, and he is brave; it 
was he who killed Scarface in single combat. And may have had his death from 
it."
"Why should he want to speak to me?"
"He says, mestra, that it is a matter concerning his sister. And he begs you in 
the name of Avarra the pitiful that you will come. And he is young enough:, 
almost, to be your son."
"So," Kindra said at last. She had not seen her own son since he was eight days 
old; and he would, she thought, be too young to bear a sword. "I cannot refuse 
anyone who begs me in the name of the God­dess," she said, and rose, frowning; 
young Marco had said he had no sister. No; he had said that there was none, now, 
that he could call sister. Which might be a different thing.
On the stairs she heard the voice of one of Brydar's men, expostulating, "Lad, 
we won't hurt ye, but if we don't get to that wound and tend to it, you could 
die, do ye hear?"
"Get away from me!" The young voice cracked. "I swear by Zandu's hells, and, by 
the spilt tripes of Scarface out there dead, I'll shove this knife into the 
throat of the first man who touches me!"
Inside, by torchlight, Kindra saw Marco half - sitting, half - lying on a straw 
pallet; he had a dagger in his hand, holding them away with it; but he was pale 
as death, and there was icy sweat on his forehead. The straw pallet was slowly 
reddening with a pool of blood. Kindra knew enough of wounds to know that the 
human body could lose more blood than most people thought possible without 
serious danger; but to any ordinary person it looked most alarming.
Marco saw Kindra and gasped, "Mestra, I beg you - I must speak with you alone - 
"
"That's no way to speak to a comrade, lad," said one of the mercenaries, 
kneeling behind him, as Kindra knelt beside the pallet. The wound was high on 
the leg, near the groin; the leather breeches had broken the blow somewhat, or 
the boy would have met the same fate as the man Annelys had struck with the axe.
"You little fool," Kindra said. "I can't do half as much for you as your friend 
can."
Marco's eyes closed for a moment, from pain or weakness. Kindra thought he had 
lost consciousness, and gestured to the man behind him. "Quick", now, while he 
is unconscious - " she said swiftly, but the tortured eyes flicked open.
"Would you betray me, too?" He gestured with the dagger, but so feebly that 
Kindra was shocked. There was certainly no time to be lost. The best thing was 
to humor him.
"Go," she said, "I'll reason with him, and if he won't listen, well, he is old 
enough to take the consequences of his folly." Her mouth twisted as the men went 
away. "I hope what you have to tell me is worth risking your life for, you 
lackwitted simpleton!"
But a great and terrifying suspicion was born in her as she knelt on the bloody 
pallet. "You fool, do you know this is likely to be your death wound? I have 
small skill at leech craft; your comrades could do better for you."
"It is sure to be my death unless you help me," said the hoarse, weakening 
voice. "None of these men is comrade enough that I could trust him . . . mestra, 
help me, I beg you, in the name of the merciful Avarra - I am a woman."
Kindra drew a sharp breath. She had begun to suspect - and it was true, then. 
"And none of Brydar's men knows - "
"None. I have dwelt among them for half a year, and I do not think any man of 
them suspects - and I fear women even more. But you, you I felt I might trust - 
"
"I swear it," Kindra said hastily. "I am oath - bound never to refuse aid to any 
woman who asks me in the name of the Goddess. But let me help you now, my poor 
girl, and pray Avarra you have not delayed too long!"
"Even if it was so - " the strange girl whispered - "I would rather die as a 
woman, than - disgraced and exposed. I have known so much disgrace - "
"Hush! Hush, child!" But she fell back against the pallet; she had really 
fainted, this time, at last; and Kindra cut away the leather breeches, looking 
at the serious cut that sliced through the top of the thigh and into the pubic 
mound. It had bled heavily, but was not, Kindra thought, fatal. She picked up 
one of the clean towels the men had left, pressed heavily against the wound; 
when it slowed to an ooze, she frowned, thinking it should be stitched. She 
hesitated to do it - she had little skill at such things, and she was sure the 
man from Brydar's band could do it more tidily and sure - handed; but she knew 
that was exactly what the young woman had feared, to be handled and ex­posed by 
men. Kindra thought: // it could be done before she recovers consciousness, she 
need not know . . . But she had promised the girl, and she would keep her 
promise. The girl did not stir as she stepped out into the hall.
Brydar came halfway up the stairs. "How goes it?"
"Send young Annelys to me," Kindra said. "Tell her to bring linen thread and a 
needle; and linen for bandages, and hot water and soap." Annelys had cour­age 
and strength; what was more, she was sure that if Kindra asked her to keep a 
secret, Annelys would do so, instead of gossiping about it.
Brydar said, in an undertone that did not carry a yard past Kindra's ear, "It's 
a woman - isn't it?"
Kindra demanded, with a frown. "Were you list­ening?"
"Listening, hell! I've got the brains I was born with, and I was remembering a 
couple of other little things. Can you think of any other reason a member of my 
band wouldn't let us get his britches off? Whoever she is, she's got guts enough 
for two!"
Kindra shook her head in dismay. Then all the girl's suffering was useless, 
scandal and disgrace there would be in any case. "Brydar, you pledged this would 
be worth my while. Do you owe me, or not?"
"I owe you," Brydar said.
"Then swear by your sword that you will never open your mouth about this, and I 
am paid. Fair enough?"
Brydar grinned. "I won't cheat you out of your pay for that," he said. "You 
think I want it to get round these hills that Brydar of Fen Hills can't tell the 
men from the ladies? Young Marco rode with my band for half a year and proved 
himself the man. If his foster - sister or kinswoman or cousin or what you will 
chooses to nurse him herself, and take him home with her afterward, what's it to 
any of my men? Damned if I want my crew thinking some girl killed Scarface right 
under my nose!" He put his hand to sword - hilt. "Zandru take this hand with the 
palsy if I say any word about this. I'll send Annelys to you," he promised, and 
went.
Kindra returned to the girl's side. She was still uncon­scious; when Annelys 
came in, Kindra said curtly, "Hold the lamp there; I want to get this stitched 
before she recovers consciousness. And try not to get squeamish or faint; I want 
to get it done quick enough so we don't have to hold her down while we do it."
Annelys gulped at the sight of the girl and the gaping wound, which had begun to 
bleed again. "A woman! Blessed Evanda! Kindra, is she one of your Sisterhood? 
Did you know?"
"No, to both questions. Here, hold the light - "
"No," said Annelys. "I have done this many times; I have steady hands for this. 
Once when my brother cut his thigh chopping wood, I sewed it up, and I have 
helped the midwife, too. You hold the light."
Relieved, Kindra surrendered the needle. Annelys began her work as skillfully as 
if she were embroider­ing a cushion; halfway through the business, the girl 
regained consciousness; she gave a faint cry of fright, but Kindra spoke to her, 
and she quieted and lay still, her teeth clamped in her lip, clinging to 
Kindra's hand. Halfway through, she moistened her lip and whis­pered, "Is she 
one of you, mestra?"
"No. No more than yourself, child. But she is a friend. And she will not gossip 
about you, I know it," Kindra said confidently.
When Annelys had finished, she fetched a glass of wine for the woman, and held 
her head while she drank it. Some color came back into the pale cheeks, and she 
was breathing more easily. Annelys brought one of her own nightgowns and said, 
"You will be more comfortable in this, I think. I wish we could carry you to my 
bed, but I don't think you should be moved yet. Kindra, help me to lift her." 
With a pillow and a couple of clean sheets she set about making the woman 
comfortable on the straw pallet.
The stranger made a faint sound of protest as they began to undress her, but was 
too weak to protest effectively. Kindra stared in shock as the under tunic came 
off. She would never have believed that any woman over fourteen could 
successfully pose as a man among men; yet this woman had done it, and now she 
saw how. The revealed form was flat, spare, breastless; the shoulders had the 
hardened musculature of any swordsman. There was more hair on the arms than most 
women would have tolerated without removing it somehow, with bleach or wax. 
Annelys stared in amaze­ment, and the woman, seeing that shocked look, hid her 
face in the pillow. Kindra said sharply, "There is no need to stare. She is 
emmasca, that is all; haven't you ever seen one before?" The neutering operation 
was illegal all over Darkover, and dangerous; and in this woman it must have 
been done before, or shortly after puberty. She was filled with questions, but 
cour­tesy forbade any of them.
"But - but - " Annelys whispered. "Was she born so or made so? It is unlawful - 
who would dare - "
"Made so," the girl said, her face still hidden in the pillow. "Had I been born 
so, I would have had noth­ing to fear . . . and I chose this so that I might 
have nothing more to fear!"
She tightened her mouth as they lifted and turned her; Annelys gasped aloud at 
the shocking scars, like the marks of whips, across the woman's back; but she 
said nothing, only pulled the merciful concealment of her own nightgown over the 
frightful revelation of those scars. Gently, she washed the woman's face and 
hands with soapy water. The ginger - pale hair was dark with sweat, but at the 
roots Kindra saw something else, the hair was beginning to grow in fire - red 
there.
Comyn. The telepath caste, red - haired . . . this woman was a noblewoman, bom 
to rule in the Domains of Darkover!
In the name of all the Gods, Kindra wondered, who can she be, what has come to 
her? How came she here in this disguise, even her hair bleached so none can 
guess at her lineage? And who has mishandled her so? She must have been beaten 
like an animal . . .
And then, shocked, she heard the words forming in her mind, not knowing how.
Scarface, said the voice in her mind. But now I am avenged. Even if it means my 
death . . .
She was frightened; never had she so clearly per­ceived; her rudimentary 
telepath gift had always, be­fore, been a matter of quick intuition, hunch, 
lucky guess. She whispered aloud, in horror and dismay, "By the Goddess! Child, 
who are you?"
The pale face contorted in a grimace which Kindra recognized, in dismay, was 
intended for a smile. "I am - no one," she said. "I had thought myself the 
daughter of Alaric Lindir. Have you heard the tale?"
Alaric Lindir. The Lindir family were a proud and wealthy family, distantly akin 
to the Aillard family of the Comyn. Too highly born, in fact, for Kindra to 
claim acquaintance with any of that kin; they were of the ancient blood of the 
Hastur - kin.
"Yes, they are a proud people," whispered the woman. "My mother's name was 
Kyria, and she was a younger sister to Dom Lewis Ardais - not the Ardais Lord, 
but his younger brother. But still, she was high­born enough that when she 
proved to be with child by one of the Hastur lords of Thendara, she was hurried 
away and married in haste to Alaric Lindir. And my
father - he that I had always believed my father - he
r; all during my childhood I heard how proud he was of me, for I
was proud of his red - haired daughter; all during m>
would marry into Comyn, or go to one of the Towers and become a great and 
powerful sorceress or Keeper. And then - then came Scarface and his crew, and 
they sacked the castle, and carried away some of the women, just as an 
afterthought, and by the time Scarface dis­covered who he had as his latest 
captive - well, the damage was done, but still he sent to my father for ransom. 
And my father, that selfsame Dom Alaric who had not enough proud words for his 
red - haired beauty who should further his ambition by a proud marriage into the 
Comyn, my father - " She choked, then spat the words out. "He sent word that if 
Scarface could guarantee me - untouched - then he would ran­som me at a great 
price; but if not, then he would pay nothing. For if I was - was spoilt, ravaged 
- then I was no use to him, and Scarf ace might hang me or give me to one of his 
men, as he saw fit."
"Holy Bearer of Burdens!" Annelys whispered. "And this man had reared you as his 
own child?"
"Yes - and I had thought he loved me," she said, her face twisting. Kindra 
closed her eyes in horror, seeing all too clearly the man who had welcomed his 
wife's bastard - but only while she could further his ambition.
Annelys' eyes were filled with tears. "How dread­ful! Oh, how could any man - "
"I have come to believe any man would do so," the girl said, "for Scarface was 
so angry at my father's refusal that he gave me to one of his men to be a 
plaything, and you can see how he used me. That one I killed while he lay 
sleeping one night, when at last he had come to believe me beaten into 
submission - and so made my escape, and back to my mother, and she welcomed me 
with tears and with pity, but I could see in her mind that her greatest fear, 
now, was that I should shame her by bearing the child of Scarface's bastard; she 
feared that my father would say to her, like mother, like daughter, and my 
disgrace would revive the old story of her own. And I could not forgive my 
mother - that she should continue to love and to live with that man who had 
rejected me and given me over to such a fate. And so I made my way to a leronis, 
who took pity on me - or perhaps she, too, wanted only to be certain I would not 
disgrace my Comyn blood by becoming a whore or a bandit's drab -  and she made 
me emmasca, as you see. And I took service with Brydar's men, and so I won my 
revenge - "
Annelys was weeping; but the girl lay with a face like stone. Her very calm was 
more terrible than hys­teria; she had gone beyond tears, into a place where 
grief and satisfaction were all one, and that one wore the face of death.
Kindra said softly, "You are safe now; none will harm you. But you must not talk 
any more; you are weary, and weakened with loss of blood. Come, drink the rest 
of this wine and sleep, my girl." She sup­ported the girl's head while she 
finished the wine, filled with horror. And yet, through the horror, was 
admiration. Broken, beaten, ravaged, and then re­jected, this girl had won free 
of her captors by killing one of them; and then she had survived the further 
rejection of her family, to plot her revenge, and to carry it out, as a noble 
might do.
And the proud Comyn rejected this woman? She has the courage of any two of their 
menfolk! It is this kind of pride and folly that will one day bring the reign of 
the Comyn crashing down into ruin! And she shud­dered with a strange premonitory 
fear, seeing with her wakening telepathic gift a flashing picture of flames over 
the Hellers, strange sky - ships, alien men walking the streets of Thendara clad 
in black leather . . .
The woman's eyes closed, her hands tightening on Kindra's. "Well, I have had my 
revenge," she whis­pered again, "and so I can die. And with my last breath I 
will bless you, that I die as a woman, and not in this hated disguise, among men 
. . ."
"But you are not going to die," Kindra said. "You will live, child."
"No." Her face was set stubbornly in lines of re­fusal, closed and barriered. 
"What does life hold for a woman friendless and without kin? I could endure to 
live alone and secret, among men, disguised, while I nursed the thought of my 
revenge to strengthen me for the - the daily pretense. But I hate men, I loathe 
the way they speak of women among themselves, I would rather die than go back to 
Brydar's band, or live further among men."
Annelys said softly, "But now you are revenged, now you can live as a woman 
again."
Again the nameless woman shook her head. "Live as a woman, subject to men like 
my father? Go back and beg shelter from my mother, who might give me bread in 
secret so I would not disgrace them further by dying across her doorstep, and 
keep me hidden away, to drudge among them hidden, sew or spin, when I have 
ridden free with a mercenary band? Or shall I live as a lone woman, at the mercy 
of men? I would rather face the mercy of the blizzard and the ban­shee!" Her 
hand closed on Kindra's. "No," she said, "I would rather die."
Kindra drew the girl into her arms, holding her against her breast. "Hush, my 
poor girl, hush, you are over - wrought, you must not talk like that. When you 
have slept you will not feel this way," she soothed, but she felt the depth of 
despair in the woman in her arms, and her rage overflowed.
The laws of her Guild forbade her to speak of the Sisterhood, to tell this girl 
that she could live free, protected by the Guild Charter, never again to be at 
the mercy of any man. The laws of the Guild, which she might not break, the oath 
she must keep. And yet on a deeper level, was it not breaking the oath to 
withhold from this woman, who had risked so much and who had appealed to her in 
the name of her Goddess, the knowledge that might give her the will to live?
Whatever I do, I am forsworn; either I break my oath by refusing this girl my 
help, or I break it by speaking when I am forbidden by the law to speak.
The law! The law made by men, which still hemmed her in on every side, though 
she had cast off the ordinary laws by which men forced women to live! And she 
was doubly damned if she spoke of the Guild before Annelys, though Annelys had 
fought at her side. The just law of the Hellers would protect Annelys from this 
knowledge; it would make trouble for the Sisterhood if Kindra should lure away a 
daughter of a respectable innkeeper, whose mother needed her, and needed the 
help her husband would bring to the run­ning of her inn!
Against her breast, the nameless girl had closed her eyes. Kindra caught the 
faint thread of her thoughts; she knew that the telepath caste could will 
themselves to die ... as this girl had willed herself to live, despite 
everything that had happened, until she had had her cherished revenge.
Let me sleep so . . . and I can believe myself in my mother's arms, in the days 
when I was still her child and this horror had not touched me . . . Let me sleep 
so and never wake . . .
Already she was drifting away, and for a moment, in despair, Kindra was tempted 
to let her die. The law forbids me to speak. And if she should speak, then 
Annelys, already struck with hero - worship of Kindra, already rebelling against 
a woman's lot, having tasted the pride of defending herself, Annelys would 
follow her, too. Kindra knew it, with a strange, premonitory shiver.
She let the rage in her have its way and overflow. She shook the nameless woman 
awake, knowing that already she was willing herself to death.
"Listen to me! Listen! You must not die," she said angrily. "Not when you have 
suffered so much! That is a coward's way, and you have proven again and again 
that you are no coward!"
"Oh, but I am a coward," the woman said. "I am too much a coward to live in the 
only way a woman like me can live - through the charity of women such as my 
mother - or the mercy of men like my father, or like Scarface! I dreamed that 
when I had my revenge, I could find some other way. But there is no other way."
And Kindra's rage and resolution overflowed. She looked despairing over the 
nameless woman's head, into Annelys' frightened eyes. She swallowed, know­ing 
the seriousness of the step she was about to take.
"There - there might be another way," she said, still temporizing. "You - I do 
not even know your name, what is your name?"
"I am nameless," the woman said, her face like stone. "I swore I would never 
again speak the name given me by the father and the mother who rejected me. If I 
had lived, I would have taken another name. Call me what pleases you."
And with a great surge of wrath, Kindra made up her mind. She drew the girl 
against her.
"I will call you Camilla," she said, "for from this day forth, I swear it, I 
shall be mother and sister to you, as was the blessed Cassilda to Camilla; this 
I swear. Camilla, you shall not die," she said, pulling the girl upright. Then, 
with a deep resolute breath, clasping Camilla's hand in one of hers, and 
stretching the other to Annelys, she began.
"My little sisters, let me tell you of the Sisterhood of Free Women, which men 
call Free Amazons. Let me tell you of the ways of the Renunciates, the Oath - 
bound, the Comhi - Letzii..."
(1979)
 
Elbow Room
 
Sometimes I feel the need to go to confession on my way to work.
It's quiet at first dawn, with Aleph Prime not above the horizon yet; there's 
always some cognitive disso­nance because, with the antigravs turned up high 
enough for comfort, you feel that the "days" ought to reflect a planet of human 
mass, not a mini - planetoid space station. So at first dawn you're set for an 
ordinary - sized day; twenty hours, or twenty - three, or something your 
circadian rhythms could compromise with. Thus when Prime sets again for first 
dark you aren't pre­pared for it. With your mind, maybe, but not down where you 
need it, in your guts. By third dawn you're gearing up for a whole day on 
Checkout Station again, and you can cope with third dark and fifth dark and by 
twelfth dark you're ready to put on your sleep mask and draw the curtains and 
shut it all out again till first dawn next day.
But at first dawn you get that illusion, and I always enjoy it for a little 
while. It's like being really alone on a silent world, a real world. And even 
before I came here to Checkout I was always a loner, preferring my own company 
to anyone else's.
That's the kind they always pick for the Vortex stations, like Checkout. There 
isn't much company there. And we learn to give each other elbow room.
You'd think, with only five of us here - or is it only four; I've never been 
quite sure, for reasons I'll go into later - we'd do a lot of socializing. You'd 
think we would huddle together against the enormous agoraphobia of space. I 
really don't know why we don't. I guess, though, the kind of person who could 
really enjoy living on Checkout - and I do - would have to be a loner. And I go 
squirrelly when there are too many other people around.
Of course, I know I couldn't really live here alone, as much as I'd like to. 
They tried that, early in the days of the Vortex stations, sending one man or 
woman out alone. One after another, with monotonous regu­larity, they suicided. 
Then they tried sending well - adjusted couples, small groups, sociable types 
who would huddle together and socialize, and they all went nuts and did one 
another in. I know why, of course; they saw too much of each other, and began to 
rely on one another for their sanity and self - validation. And of course that 
solution didn't work. You have to be the kind of person who can be wholly self - 
reliant.
So now they do it this way. I always know I'm not alone. But I never have to see 
too much of the other people here; I never have to see them unless I want to. I 
don't know how much socializing the others do, but I suspect they're as much 
loners as I am. I don't really care, as long as they don't intrude on my privacy 
and as long as they take orders the way they're supposed to. I love them all, of 
course, all four or maybe five of them. They told me, back at Psych 
Conditioning, that this would happen. But I don't remember how it hap­pened, 
whether it just happened or whether they made it happen. I don't ask too many 
questions. I'm glad that I love them; I'd hate to think that some Psych - tech 
made me love them! Because they're sweet, dear, wonderful, lovable people. All 
of them.
As long as I don't have to see them very often.
Because I'm the boss. I'm in control. It's my Sta­tion! Slight tendencies toward 
megalomania, they called it in Psych. It's good for a Station Programmer to have 
these mild megalomanic tendencies, they explained it all to me. If they put 
humble self - effacing types out here, they'd start thinking of themselves as 
wee little fleabites upon the vast face of the Universe, and sooner or later 
they'd be found with their throats cut, because they couldn't believe they were 
big enough to be in control of anything on the cosmic scale of the Vortex.
Lonely, yes. But I like it that way. I like being boss out here. And I like the 
way they've provided for my needs. I think I have the best chef in the galaxy. 
She cooks all my favorite foods - I suppose Psych gave her my profile. I wonder 
sometimes if the other people at the station have to eat what I like, or if they 
get to order their own favorites. I don't really care, as long as I get to order 
what I like. And then I have my own personal librarian, with all the music of 
the galaxy at her fingertips, the best sound - equipment known, state - of - the 
- art stuff I'd never be able to afford in any comparable job back Earthside. 
And my own gar­dener, and a technician to do the work I can't handle. And even 
my own personal priest. Can you imagine that? Sending a priest all the way out 
here, just to minister to my spiritual needs! Well, at least to a congregation 
of four. Or five.
Or is it six? I keep thinking I've forgotten somebody.
First dawn is rapidly giving way to first noon when I leave the garden and kneel 
in the little confessional booth. I whisper "Bless me, Father, for I have 
sinned."
"Bless you, my child." Father Nicholas is there, although his Mass must be long 
over. I sometimes wonder if this doesn't violate the sanctity of the 
con­fessional, that he cannot help knowing which of his congregation is kneeling 
there; I am the only one who ever gets up before second dawn. And I don't really 
know whether I have sinned or not. How could I sin against God or my fellow man, 
when I am thousands of millions of miles away from all but five or six of them? 
And I so seldom see the others, I have no chance to sin with them or against 
them. Maybe I only need to hear his voice; a human voice, a light, not 
particularly masculine voice. Deeper than mine, though different from mine. 
That's the important thing; to hear a voice which isn't mine.
"Father, I have entertained doubts about the nature of God."
"Continue, my child."
"When I was out in the Wheel the other day, watch­ing the Vortex, I found myself 
wondering if the Vor­tex was God. After all, God is unknowable, and the Vortex 
is so totally alien from human experience. Isn't this the closest thing that the 
human race has ever found, to the traditional view of God? Something to­tally 
beyond matter, energy, space or time?"
There is a moment of silence. Have I shocked the priest? But after a long time 
his soft voice comes quietly into the little confessional. Outside the light is 
already dimming toward first dark.
"There is no harm in regarding the Vortex as a symbol of God's relationship to 
man, my child. After all, the Vortexes are perhaps the most glorious of God's 
works. It is written in scripture that the Heavens declare the glory of God, and 
the firmament proclaims the wonder of His work."
"But does this mean, then, that God is distant, incapable of loving mankind? I 
can't imagine the Vor­tex loving anyone or being conscious of anyone. Not even 
me."
"Is that a defect in God, or a defect in your own imagination, my child, in 
ascribing limits to God's power?"
I persist. "But does it matter if I say my prayers to the Vortex, and worship 
it?"
Behind the screen I hear a soft laugh. "God will hear your prayers wherever you 
say them, dear child, and whenever you find anything worthy of worship and 
admiration you are worshiping God, by whatever name you choose to call it. Is 
there anything else, my child?"
"I have been guilty of uncharitable thoughts about my cook, Father. Last night 
she didn't fix my dinner till late, and I wanted to tear her eyes out!"
"Did you harm her, child?"
"No. I just yelled through the screen that she was a lazy, selfish, stupid 
bitch. I wanted to go out and hit her, but I didn't."
"Then you exercised commendable self - restraint, did you not? What did she 
answer?"
"She didn't answer at all. And that made me mad­der than ever."
"You should love your neighbor - and I mean your chef, too - as yourself, 
child," he reproves, and I say, hanging my head, "I'm not loving myself very 
much these days, maybe that's the trouble."
Mind, now, I'm not sure there really is a Father Nicholas behind that screen. 
Maybe it's a relay system which puts me into touch with a priest Earthside. Or 
maybe Father Nicholas is only a special voice program on the main computer, 
which is why I sometimes ask the craziest questions, and play a game with myself 
to see how long it takes "Father Nicholas" to find the right program for an 
answer. As I said, it seems crazy to send a priest out here for five people. Or 
is it six?
But then, why not? We people at the Vortex sta­tions keep the whole galaxy 
running. Nothing is too good for us, so why not my personal priest?
"Tell me what is troubling you, my child."
Always my child. Never by name. Does he even know it? He must. After all, I am 
in charge here; Checkout Programmer. The boss. Or is this just the. manners of 
the confessional, a subtle way of reemphasizing that all of us are the same to 
him, equal in his sight and in the sight of God? I don't know if I like that. 
It's disquieting. Perhaps my chef runs to him and tells tales of me, how I 
shrieked foul names at her, and abused her through the kitchen hatch! I cover my 
face with my hands and sob, hearing him make sooth­ing sounds.
I envy that priest, secure behind his curtain. Listen­ing to the human faults of 
others, having none of his own. I almost became a priest myself. I tell him so.
"I know that, child, you told me. But I'm not clear in my mind why you chose not 
to be ordained."
I'm not clear either, and I tell him so, trying to remember. If I had been a man 
I would surely have gone through with it, but it is still not entirely easy to 
be ordained, for a woman, and the thought of semi­nary, with ninety or a hundred 
other priestlings and priestlets herded all together, even then the thought made 
me uneasy. I couldn't have endured the fight for a woman to be ordained. "I'm 
not a fighter, Father."
But I am disquieted when he agrees with me. "No. If you were, you wouldn't be 
out here, would you?" Again I feel uneasy; am I just running away? I choose to 
live here on the ragged rim of the Universe, tending the Vortex, literally at 
the back end of Beyond. I pour all this uncertainty out to him, knowing he will 
reas­sure me, understand me as always.
But his reassuring noises are too soothing, too calming, humoring me. Damn it, 
is there anyone there behind that curtain? I want to tear it down, to see the 
priest's face, his human face, or else to be sure that it is only a bland 
computer console programmed to reas­sure and thus to mock me. My hand already 
extended, I draw it back. I don't really want to know. Let them laugh at me, if 
there is really a they, a priest Earthside listening over this unthinkable 
extension of the kilo­meters and the megakilometers, let them laugh. They 
deserve it, if they are really such clever programmers, making it possible for 
me to draw endless sympathy and reassurance from the sound of an alien voice.
Whatever we do, we do to make it possible for you to live and keep your sanity 
... "I think, Father, that I am - am a little lonely. The dreams are building up 
again."
"Perfectly natural," he says soothingly, and I know that he will arrange one of 
Julian's rare visits. Even now I hang my head, blush, cannot face him, but it is 
less embarrassing this way than if I had to take the initiative alone, unaided. 
It's part of being the kind of loner I am, that I could never endure it, to call 
Julian direct, have to take - perhaps - a rebuff or a down­right rejection. 
Well, I never claimed to be a well - adjusted personality. A well - adjusted 
personality could not survive out here, at the rim of nowhere. Back on Earthside 
I probably wouldn't even have a love life, I avoid people too much. But here 
they provide for all my needs. All. Even this one, which, left to myself, I 
would probably neglect.
Ego te absolvo.
I kneel briefly to say my penance, knowing that the ritual is foolish. 
Comforting; but foolish. He reminds me to turn on the monitor in my room and he 
will say Mass for me tomorrow. And again I am certain that there is nobody 
there, that it is a program in the computer; is there any other reason we do not 
all assemble for Christian fellowship? Or do we all share this inability to 
tolerate one another's company?
But I feel soothed and comforted as I go down between the automatic sprinklers 
through the little patch of garden tended so carefully by my own gar­dener. I 
catch a glimpse, a shimmer in the air, of someone in the garden, turned away 
like a distant reflection, but no one is supposed to be here at this hour and I 
quickly look away.
Still it is comforting not to be alone and I call out a cheery good - morning to 
the invisible image, wonder­ing, with a strange little cramp of excitement low 
in my body; is it Julian? I see him so briefly, so seldom, except in the half - 
darkness of my room on those rare occasions he conies to me. I'm not even sure 
what he does here. We don't talk about his work. We have better things to do. 
Thinking of that makes me trem­ble, squeeze my legs tight, thinking that it may 
not be long till I see him again. But I have a day's work to do, and with second 
dawn brightening the sky, glinting on reflections from which I glance away . . . 
you never look in mirrors ... I climb up into the seat that will take me up to 
the Wheel, out by the Vortex.
There is an exhilaration to that, shooting up toward the strange seething no - 
color of it. There is a ship already waiting. Waiting for me, for the Vortex to 
open. All that power and burning and fusion and raw energy, all waiting for me, 
and I enjoy my daily dose of megalomania as I push the speech button.
"Checkout speaking. Register your name and bus­iness."
It is always a shock to hear a voice from outside, a really strange voice. But I 
register the captain's voice, the name and registry number so that later they 
can match programs with Checkin, my opposite number on the far side of the 
Vortex - in a manner of speak­ing. Where the Vortex is concerned, of course, 
Near and Far, or Here and There, or Before and After, have no more meaning than 
- oh, than I and Thou. In one of the mirrors on the wheel I catch a glimpse of 
my technician, waiting, and I sit back and listen as she rattles off the 
coordinates in a sharp staccato. She and I have nothing to say to each other. I 
don't really think that girl is interested in anything except mathe­matics. I 
drift, watching myself in the mirror, listening to the ship's captain arguing 
with the technician, and I am irritated. How dare he argue, her conduct reflects 
on me and I am enraged by any hint of rudeness to my staff. So I speak the code 
which starts the Vortex into its strange nonspace whorl, the colors and swirls.
This could all be done by computers, of course.
I am here, almost literally, to push a button by hand if one gets stuck. From 
the earliest days of teleme­tered equipment, machinery has tended to go flukey 
and sometimes jam; and during the two hundred years that the Vortex stations 
have been in operation, they've found out that it's easier and cheaper to 
maintain the stations with their little crews of agoraphobic and soli­tary 
loners. They even provide us with chefs and gar­deners and all our mental and 
spiritual comforts. We humans are just software which doesn't - all things 
considered - get out of order quite as often as the elaborate self - maintaining 
machineries do. Furthermore, we can be serviced more cheaply when we do get out 
of order. So we're there to make sure that if any of the buttons stick, we can 
unstick them before they cost the Galaxy more than the whole operating costs of 
Check­out for the next fifty years.
I watch the Vortex swirl, and my knowledge and judgment tell me the same thing 
as do my instruments. "Whenever you're ready," I say, receive their 
acknowl­edgment, and then the strange metal shape of the ship swirls with the 
Vortex, becomes nonshape, I almost see it vanish into amorphous nothingness, to 
come out - or so the theory is - at Checkin Station, several hundred light - 
years away. Do these ships go anywhere at all, I wonder? Do they ever return? 
They vanish when I push those buttons, and they never come back. Am I sending 
them into oblivion, or to their proper prearranged destination? I don't know. 
And, if the truth be told, I don't really care. For all the difference it makes 
to me they could be going into another di­mension, or to the theological Hell.
But I like it out here on the Wheel. There is real solitude up here. Down there 
on Checkout there is solitude with other people around, though I seldom see 
them. I realize I am still twitching from a brief encounter with the gardener 
this morning. Don't they know, these people, that they aren't supposed to be 
around when I am walking in the gardens? But even that brief surge of adrenaline 
has been good for me, I suppose. Do they arrange for me to get a glimpse of one 
of my fellow humans only when I need that kind of stirring up?
Back at Checkout - there will not be another ship today - I walk again through 
the garden, putter a lit­tle, cherish with my eyes the choice melon I am 
grow­ing under glass, warn the gardener through the intercom not to touch it 
until I myself order it served up for my supper. I remember the satisfaction of 
the cargo ship waiting, metal tentacles silent against the black of space, 
waiting. Waiting for me, waiting for my good pleasure, gatekeeper to the Void, 
Cerberus at a new, kind of hell.
Rank has its privileges. While I am in the garden none of the others come near; 
but I am a little fatigued, I leave the garden to the others and go to my room 
for deep meditation. I can sense them all around me, the gardener working with 
the plants like an ex­tension of my own consciousness, I sit like a small spider 
at the center of a web and watch the others working as I sit back to meditate. 
My mind floats free, my alpha rhythms take over, I disappear . . .
Later, waiting for my supper, I wonder what kind of woman would become chef on a 
Checkout station. I can cook, I have done my own cooking, I am a damn good cook, 
but I wouldn't have taken a job like that. Is she completely without ambition? I 
don't see her very often. We wouldn't have much in common; what could I possibly 
have to say to a woman like that? Waiting, floating, spider in my web, I find I 
can imag­ine her going carefully through the motions and little soothing 
rituals, chopping fresh vegetables I fingered in the garden this morning, 
heating the trays, all the little soothing mindless things. But to spend her 
life like that? The woman must be a fool.
I come out of the meditative state to find my supper waiting for me. I call my 
thanks to her, eat. The food is good, it is always good, but the dishes are too 
hot, somehow I have burned my hand on them. But it doesn't matter, I have 
something more to look for­ward to, tonight. I delay, savoring the knowledge, 
listening to one of my operatic tapes, lost in a vague romantic reverie. 
Tonight, Julian is coming.
I wonder sometimes why we are not allowed to see one another more often. Surely, 
if he cares for me as much as he says, it would be proper to see each other 
casually now and then, to talk about our work. But I am sure Psych is right, 
that it is better for us not to see each other too often. On Earth, if we grew 
tired of one another, we could each find someone else. But here there is no one 
else - for either of us. A phrase floats through my mind from nowhere, chains of 
mne­monic suggestion, as I set the controls which will allow him to come, silent 
and alone, into my room after I have gone to bed.
He has come and gone.
I do not know why the rules are as they are. Per­haps to keep us from 
quarreling, to avoid the tragedies of the early days of the Vortex stations. 
Perhaps, simply, to avoid our growing bored with each other. As if I could ever 
be bored with Julian! To me, he is perfect, even his name. Julian has always 
seemed to me the most perfect name for a man, and Julian, my Julian, my lover, 
the perfect man to match the perfect name. So why is it we are not allowed to 
meet more often? Why can we meet like this, only in the silent dark?
Langorous, satisfied, exhausted, I muse drowsily, wondering if it is some 
obscure mystery of my inner Psych - profile, that one of us subconsciously 
desires the old myth of Pysche, who could retain her lover Eros only as long as 
she never saw his face? I see him only for a moment in the mirror, misty, never 
clearly per­ceived, over my shoulder; but I know he is handsome.
I am so sensitive to Julian's moods that I think sometimes I am developing 
special senses for my love; becoming a telepath, but only for him. When our 
bodies join it seems often as if I were one in mind with him, touching him, how 
else could I be so aware of his emotions, so completely secure of his tenderness 
and his concern? How else could he know so perfectly all my body's obscurer 
desires, when I myself can hardly bring myself to speak them, when I would be 
afraid or ashamed to voice them aloud? But he knows, he al­ways knows, leaving 
me satisfied, worn, spent. I wish, with a longing so intense it is pain, that 
the regulations by which we live would let him lie here in my arms for the rest 
of the night, that I could feel myself held close and cherished, comforted 
against this vast, eternal loneli­ness; that he could cuddle me in his arms, 
that we could meet sometimes for a drink or share our dinner. Why not?
A terrible thought comes to me. They give me ev­erything else. My own cook. My 
own gardener. My technician. My personal priest.
My very own male whore.
I cannot believe it. No, no. No. I do not believe it. Julian loves me, and I 
love him. Anyhow, it would not suit the Puritan consciences of our legislators. 
No, I can't see it; how would they justify it on the requisi­tion forms? Whore, 
male, one, Checkout Programmer, for the use of. No, such a thing couldn't 
happen. Surely they just hired some male technician, determined by Psych - 
profile to have the maximum sexual compatibil­ity with myself. That's bad 
enough, heaven knows.
Now an even more frightening thought surges up into my conscious mind. Can it be 
possible - oh, God, no! - that Julian, my Julian, is an android?
They have designed some of them, I know, with extremely sophisticated sex 
programs. I have seen them advertised in those catalogs we used to giggle over 
when we were little girls. I am sick with fear and dread at the thought that 
during those conditioning trances which I have been conditioned to forget, I 
gave up all that data about my secret dreams and desires and sexual fantasies, 
so that they might program them all into the computer of an android, and what 
emerged was . . . Julian.                 '
Is he a multipurpose android, perhaps, then? Hard­ware, no more, both useful and 
economical; perhaps that gardener I see dimly sometimes, like a hologram, in the 
distance. He could, of course, be the gardener, though in the brief glimpses of 
the gardener I had the impression the gardener was a woman. Who can tell, with 
these coveralls we all wear, uniform, unisex? And it would look better on the 
congressional requisitions: Android, one, multiprogrammed. Checkout Station, for 
the maintenance of. And a special sexual program would only be a memo in the 
files of Psych. Nothing to embarrass anyone - anyone but me, that is, and I am 
not supposed to know. Just another piece of Station hardware. For maintenance of 
the Station. And of the Station Programmer. Hardware. Yes, very. Oh, God!
I have no time now for worrying about Julian, or what he is, or about my own 
dissatisfactions and fears. I cannot take any of these disquieting thoughts to 
that computerized priest, if he is indeed only a sophisti­cated computer, a 
mechanical priest - psychiatrist! Is he another android, perhaps? Or is he 
indeed the same android with still another program? Priest and male whore at the 
flip of a switch? Am I alone here with a multipurpose android serving all my 
functions? No time for that. A ship is out there, waiting for me; and my 
instruments tell me, as I ride out to the Wheel, even before I get the message; 
that ship is in trouble.
Perhaps all the signs, all my fears that I am going mad, are simply signs of 
developing telepathic poten­tial; I never believed that I was even potentially 
an esper, yet somehow I am aware of nearly everything my technician said to the 
ship's captain. I did not un­derstand it all, of course, I have no technical 
skill at all. My skills are all executive. I can barely manage to make my little 
pocket calculator figure out the tariffs for the ships I send into the Vortex; I 
joked with Central that they should allow me a bookkeeper, but they are too 
stingy. But even though I did not under­stand all of what the technician said, 
when I read the report she left for me, I know that if the ship went into the 
Vortex in this state, it might never emerge; worse, it might create spatial 
anomalies to disturb the fields for other ships and put the Vortex very badly 
out of commission. So I know that they dare not pass through that gate; I cannot 
follow the precise mathematics of the switch, though, and I feel like a fool. 
When I was in preparatory school I tested higher in all the groups, including 
mathematical ability. But I ended up with no technical skill. How, I wonder, did 
that happen?
Later I have leisure to visit the captain by screen. He is a big man, youthful, 
soft - spoken, his smile strangely stirring. And he asks me a strange question.
"You are the Programmer? Are you people a clone?"
"Why, no, nothing like that," I say to him, and ask why.
"The technician - she's very like you. Oh, of course, you are nothing alike 
otherwise, she's all business - a shame, in a lovely young woman! I could hardly 
get her to say a pleasant word to me!"
I tell him that I am an only child. Only children are best for work like this; 
the necessary isolation from peer groups. A child reared in a puppy - pack, 
under peer pressure from siblings and agemates, becomes other - directed; 
dependent upon the opinions and the approval of others, without the inner 
resources to tolerate the solitude which is the breath of life to me. I am even 
a little offended. "I can't see the slightest resemblance between us," I tell 
him, and he shakes his head and says diplomatically that perhaps it is a 
simi­larity of height and coloring which misled him.
"Anyway, I didn't like her much, she flayed me with her tongue, kept strictly to 
business - you'd think it was my fault the ship was out of commission! You're 
much, much pleasanter than she is!"
And that is as it should be, I am the one with leisure for reflection and 
conversation; it wouldn't be right for my technician to waste her time talking! 
So we talk, we even flirt a little. I am aware of it; I pose and preen a little 
for him, letting the animal woman surface from all the other faces I wear, and 
finally I agree to the hazardous step, to visit him on his ship.
So strange, so strange to think of being with one who is not carefully Psych - 
profiled to be agreeable to me. There is nothing in the regulations against it, 
of course, perhaps they believe our love of solitude will keep us away as it has 
always done before, for me. Even a little welcome, alien. But when I am actually 
through the airlock I am shocked into silence by the strange faces, the alien 
smells, the different body - chemistry of strange male life. They say that men 
give off hormones, analogous to pheromones in the lower kingdoms, which they 
cannot smell on one another; which only a woman is chemically able to smell. I 
believe, it, it is true, the ship reeks of maleness. Ush­ered into a room where 
I may strip my suit I avoid the mirror. Never look into a mirror, unless . . . 
unless . . . why would Psych have imprinted that prohibition on me? I need to 
see that my hair is tidy, my coverall free of grease. Defiantly I look into it 
anyway, my head swims and I look away in haste.
Fear, fear of what I may see, my face dissolving, identity lost. . . stranger, 
not myself, unknown. . . .
A drink in my hand, flattery and compliments; I find I am hungry for this after 
long isolation. Of course I am selfish and vain, it is a professional necessity, 
like my little touch of daily megalomania. I accept this, and revel in seeing 
others, interacting with strange faces - really strange, not programmed to my 
personal needs and wishes. Yes, I know I need to be alone, I remember all the 
reasons, but I know also, too well, the terrible face of loneliness. All my 
carefully chosen companions are so dovetailed to my personality that talking to 
them is like . . . like talking to myself, like looking in a mirror . . .
Two drinks help me unwind, relax. I know all the dangers of alcohol, but tonight 
I am defiant; we are off duty, both the captain and myself, we need not guard 
ourselves. Before too long I find the captain's hands on me, touching me, 
rousing me in a way Julian has not done since his first visits. I give myself 
over to his kisses, and when he asks the inevitable question I brace myself for 
a moment, then shrug and ask myself Why not? His touch on me is welcome, I brush 
aside thoughts of Julian, even Julian has been too carefully adjusted, 
dovetailed, programmed to my own person­ality; perhaps even a little 
abrasiveness helps to alter the far - too - even tenor of the days, to create 
something of the necessary otherness of lovemaking. That is what I have missed, 
the otherness; Julian being too care­fully selected and Psych - profiled to me.
If a love - partner is too similar to the self there is not the needed, 
satisfying merging. Even the amoeba which splits itself, infinitely 
reduplicating perfect analogies of its own personality and awareness, feels now 
and then the need to merge, to exchange its very protoplasm and cell - stuff 
with the other; too much of even the most necessary similarity is deadly, and 
makes of love - making only a more elaborate and ritualized masturba­tion. It is 
good to be touched by another.
Together, then, into his room. And our bodies merge abruptly into an unlovely 
struggle at the height of which he blurts out, as if in shock, "But you couldn't 
possibly be that inexperienced ..." and then, seeing and sensing my shock, he is 
all gentleness again, apol­ogetic, saying he had forgotten how young I was. I am 
confused and distressed; I inexperienced? Now I am on my mettle, to prove myself 
equal to passion, so­phisticated and knowledgeable, tolerating discomfort and 
strangeness, to think longingly of Julian. It serves me right, to be unfaithful 
to him, Psych was right, Julian is exactly what I need; I know, even while the 
captain and I are lying close, afterward, all tenderness, that I will not do 
this again. The regulations are wise. Back to the Station, back to my quarters, 
blur the experience all away in sleep, all of it ... awkward­ness, struggle that 
felt like rape ... no, I will not do this again, I know now why it is forbidden. 
I do not think I will confess it even to the priest, I have done penance enough. 
Seal it all away in some inaccessible part of my mind, the bruising and 
humiliation of the memory.
Flotsam in my mind from the vast amnesia of the training program, as I seek to 
forget, that conditioning they will never let us remember; that J am suitable 
for this work because I dissociate with abnormal rapidity. . . .
And next morning at firstdawn I go up even before breakfast to the Wheel, their 
repairs are made and they do not want to lose time. The captain wants to speak 
with me, but I let him speak with the technician while I watch out of sight. I 
do not want to look into his face again; I never want to see again in any face 
that mixture of tenderness, pity - contempt.
I am glad to see their ship dissolve into the vast nonshape of the Vortex. I do 
not care if their repairs have been made properly or if they lose themselves 
somewhere inside the Vortex and never return. Watching their shape vanish I see 
a face dissolving in a mirror and I am agitated and frightened, frightened . . . 
they are not part of my world, I have seen them go, I have perhaps destroyed 
them. I think of how easy it would have been, how glad I would have been if my 
technician had given them the wrong program and they had vanished into the 
Vortex and come out . . . nowhere. As I have destroyed everything not the self.
Julian has been destroyed for me too. . . .
Maybe there is nothing out there, no ship, no Vor­tex, nothing. Everything comes 
into the human mind through the filters of self, my priest created to absolve a 
self which is not there, or is it the priest who is not there at all? Maybe 
there is nothing out there, maybe I created it all out of my own inner needs, 
priest, ship, Station, Vortex, perhaps I am still lying in the condi­tioning 
trances down there on Earth, fantasizing peo­ple who would help me to survive 
the terrors of loneliness, perhaps these people whom I see, but never clearly, 
are all androids, or fantasies born of my own madness and my inner needs ... a 
random phrase floats again through my mind, always the danger of solipsism, in 
the dissociator, the feeling that only the self exists . . . eternal 
preoccupation with internal states is morbid and we take advantage . . .
Was there ever a ship out there? Did my mind create it to break the vast 
monotony of solitude, the loneliness I find I cannot endure, did I even 
fantasize the captain's gross body lying on my own?
Or is it Julian that I created, my own hands on my body, fantasy . . .a half - 
lighted image in a mirror . . .
The terrible solitude, the solitude I need and yet cannot endure, the solitude 
that is madness. And yet I need the solitude, so that I will not kill them all, 
I could murder them as all the earlier Vortex stations murdered one another, or 
is it only suicide when there is nothing but myself?
Is the whole cosmos out there - stars, galaxies, Vortex - only an emanation of 
my own brain? If so, then I can unmake it with a thought as I made it. I can 
snatch up my cook's kitchen knife and plunge it into my throat and all the stars 
will go away and all the universes. What am I doing in the kitchen . . . the 
cook's knife in my hand . . . here where I never go? She will be angry; I am 
supposed to give her the same privacy I yield to myself, I call out an apology 
and leave. Or is that pointless, am I crying out apology or abuse to myself? I 
have had no breakfast, at this hour, near thirddawn, the cook always prepares, I 
always prepare breakfast, I meditate while breakfast is pre­pared and served to 
me on my tray, facing the mirror from which I emerge ... I am the other, the one 
with leisure for meditation and reflection - the executive, creative, I am God 
creating all these universes inside and outside of my mind . . . dizzied, I 
catch at the mirror, the knife slips, my face dissolves, my hand bleeds and all 
the universes wobble and spin on their cosmic axes, the face in the mirror 
commands in the voice of Father Nicholas, "Go, my child, and meditate."
"No! No!" I refuse to be tranquilized again, to be deceived . . .
"Command over - ride!" A voice I do not remember. "Go and meditate, meditate 
..." meditate, meditate. . .
Like the tolling of a great bell, commanding, rising out of the deeps, the voice 
of God. I meditate, seeing my face dissolve and change. . . .
No wonder I can read the technician's mind, I am the technician . . .
There is no one here. There has never been anyone here.
Only myself, and I am all, I am the God, the maker and unmaker of all the 
universes, I am Brahma, I am the Cosmos and the Vortex, I am the slow 
unraveling. . . . . . unraveling of the mind . . .
I stumble to the chapel, images dissolving in my mind like the cook's face with 
the knife, into the confessional, the confessional I have always known is empty, 
sob out a prayer to the empty shrine. Oh, God, if there is a God, let there be a 
God, let there be somebody there . . . or is God too only an emanation of my 
mind . . .
And the slow dissolve into the mirror, the priest's voice saying soothing things 
which I do not really hear, the mirror as my mind dissolves, the priest's voice 
soothing and calm, my own voice weeping, plead­ing, sobbing, begging . . .
But his words mean nothing, a fragment of my own disintegration, I want to die, 
I want to die, I am dying, gone, nowhere . . .
The phenomenon of selective attention, what used to be called hypnosis, a self - 
induced dissociation or fugue state, dissociational hysteria sometimes regarded 
as mul­tiple personality when the fragmented self - organized chains of memory 
and personality sets organize themselves into different consciousness. There is 
always the danger of solipsism, but the personality defends itself with 
enor­mously complex coping mechanisms. For instance, al­though we knew she had 
briefly attended a seminary, we had not expected the priest. . . .
"Ego te absolve. Make a good act of contrition, my child."
I murmur the foolish, comforting, ritual words. He says, gently, "Go and 
meditate, child, you will feel better."
He is right. He is always right. I think sometimes that Father Nicholas is my 
conscience. That, of course, is the function of a priest. I meditate. All the 
terrors dissolve while I sit quietly in meditation, spinning the threads of this 
web where I sit, happy at the center, conscious of all the others moving around 
me. I must be developing esper powers, there is no other explana­tion, for while 
I sit quietly here meditating in the chapel the soothing vibrations of the 
garden come up through my fingers while my gardener works quietly, detached and 
calm, in my garden, growing delicious things for my supper. I love them all, all 
my friends around me here, they are all so kind to me, protecting my precious 
solitude, my privacy. I cannot cook the lovely things he grows, so I sit in my 
cherished solitude while my cook creates all manner of delicious things for my 
supper. How kind she is to me, a sweet woman really, though I know that I would 
have noth­ing to say to a woman like that. I waken out of meditation to see 
supper in my tray. How quickly the day has gone, seventhdawn brightening into 
seventh - noon, and darkness will be upon all of us again soon. How good it is, 
how sweet and fresh the food from my own garden; I call my thanks to her, this 
cook who spends all her time thinking up delightful things for me to eat. She 
must have esper powers too, my prize melon is on my tray, she knew exactly what 
I wanted after such a day as this.
"Good - night, dear cook, thank you, God bless you, goodnight."
She does not answer, I know she will not answer, she knows her place, but I know 
she hears and is pleased at my praise.
"Sleep well, my dear, good - night."
As I go to my room through the dimming of eighthdark, it crosses my mind that 
sometimes I am a little lonely here. But I am doing important work, and after 
all, the Psych people knew what they were doing. They knew that I need elbow 
room.
(1980)
 
Blood Will Tell
 
 
Dio Ridenow saw them first in the lobby of the luxury hotel serving humans, and 
humanoids, on the pleasure world of Vainwal. They were tall, sturdy men, but it 
was the blaze of red hair on the elder of them that drew her eyes. Comyn red. He 
was past fifty and walked with a limp, stiff - kneed; his back was bent. Behind 
him walked a young man in nondescript clothing, tall, dark - haired and black - 
browed, sullen with steel - gray eyes. Somehow he had the look of deformity, of 
suffering, which she associated with lifetime cripples, hunchbacks; yet he had 
no visible defect except a few half - healed scars along one cheek. The scars 
drew, up at the corner of his mouth into a permanent sneer, and Dio turned her 
eyes away with a faint sense of revul­sion. Why would a Comyn lord have such a 
person in his entourage? Some hanger - on, poor relation?
For it was obvious that the man was a Comyn lord. There were redheads in the 
galaxy, on other worlds, but the facial stamp, the features of the Comyn, were 
unmistakable, combined with that hair; flame - red, dusted with gray now, but 
still - Comyn. And what was he doing here? For that matter, who was he, anyhow? 
It was rare to find Darkovans anywhere ex­cept on their home world. The girl 
smiled and thought to herself that she, too, might have been asked that 
question, for she was Darkovan and far from home. Her brothers came here 
because, basically, neither was interested in political intrigue; but they had 
had to defend and justify their absence often enough.
The Comyn lord moved slowly across the hall; limp­ing, but with a kind of 
arrogance that drew all eyes, though he did nothing unusual. Dio framed it to 
her­self, in an unfocused way: he moved as if he should have been preceded by 
his own drone - pipers and wear­ing high boots and a swirling cape - not the 
drab fea­tureless Terran clothing he actually wore.
And having identified his Terran dress she suddenly knew who he was. One Comyn 
lord, and only one as far as anyone knew, had actually married, legally and with 
full ceremony, a Terran woman. He had man­aged to outface the scandal, which in 
any case had been before Dio was born; Dio had not seen him more than twice in 
her life, but now she knew who he was; Kennard Lanart - Alton, Lord Armida, self 
- exiled lord of the Alton Domain. And now she knew who the young man with the 
sullen eyes must be; this was his half - caste son, Lewis, who had been horribly 
injured during a rebellion back in the Hellers - Dio took no particular interest 
in such things and didn't know the details, she had still been playing with 
dolls when it all happened. But she knew Lew's foster sister, Linnell Aillard, 
who had a sister who was Keeper in Arilinn; and Linnell had told her of Lord 
Kennard's son Lewis and that her foster father had taken Lew to Terra in the 
hope that they could help him.
The two Comyn were standing beside the central computer of the main hotel desk; 
Kennard was giving some quietly definite order about their luggage to the human 
servants who were one of the luxury touches of the hotel, of the pleasure world. 
Dio herself had been brought up on a world where human servants were commonplace 
and could accept it without embar­rassment, but many people could not overcome 
their shyness or dismay at being waited on by people rather than servomechs or 
robots. Die's poise about such things had given her status among the other young 
women of Vainwal, many of them new - rich people who flocked to the pleasure 
worlds, knowing nothing of the refinements or niceties of good living, unable to 
accept luxury as if they had been brought up to it. Blood, Dio thought watching 
the exactly right way Kennard spoke to the servants, would always tell.
The younger man turned; Dio could see now that one hand was kept concealed in a 
fold of his coat, and that he moved awkwardly, struggling to handle some piece 
of their equipment which he did not want touched by anyone else. Kennard spoke 
to him in a low voice, but Dio could hear the impatient tone of the words, and 
the young man scowled, a black and angry scowl which made Dio shudder. Suddenly 
she realized she did not want to see any more of that young man. But from where 
she stood she could not cross the lobby without crossing their path.
She felt like lowering her head and pretending they were not there at all. After 
all, one of the delights of pleasure worlds such as Vainwal was to be 
anony­mous, free of the restrictions of class or caste on one's home world. She 
would not recognize them, give them the privacy she wanted for herself. But as 
she crossed their path the young man made a clumsy movement; he did not see Dio, 
and banged full into her. What­ever piece of luggage he was carrying slid out of 
his awkward one - handed grip and slid to the floor with a metallic clatter. He 
flung an angry word at her and stooped to retrieve it. It was long, narrow, 
closely wrapped; it might have held a pair of dueling swords, prized possessions 
never trusted to anyone else to handle. Dio automatically stepped back, but the 
young man could not get his hand on it, it slithered away, and she bent to reach 
for it and hand it to him.
"Don't touch that!" he said angrily. His voice was harsh, raw, and grating; he 
actually reached out and shoved her away from it and she saw the folded empty 
sleeve at the end of his arm. She stared, open - mouthed with indignation; she 
had only been trying to help!
"Lew!" Kennard Alton's voice was sharp with re­proof; the young man scowled and 
muttered some­thing like an apology, turning away and scrambling the wrapped 
dueling swords, or whatever they were, awkwardly into his arms, turning 
ungraciously to conceal the folded sleeve. Suddenly Dio felt herself shudder, a 
deep shudder that went all the way to the bone. But why should it affect her so? 
She had seen wounded men before; surely a missing hand was hardly reason to go 
about as this one did, with a continual outraged, defensive scowl, a black 
refusal to meet the eyes of another human being!
With a small shrug she turned away from him. There was no reason to waste 
thought or courtesy on this graceless fellow whose manners were as ugly as his 
face! Kennard was asking, "But you are a country­women, vai domna? I did not 
know there were Darkovans on Vainwal."
She dropped him a curtsy. "I am Diotima Ridenow of Serrais, my lord, and I am 
here with my brothers Lerrys and Geremy, by leave of my brother and my lord."
"I had believed you were destined for the Tower, mistress Dio."
She shook her head and knew the swift color was rising in her face. "It was so 
ordained when I was a child; I - I was invited to do so. But in the end I chose 
otherwise."
"Well, well, it is not a vocation for everyone," Kennard said genially, and she 
contrasted the charm of the father with the sneering scowl of the son, who stood 
frowning, without the most elementary formal phrases of courtesy! Was it his 
Terran blood which had robbed him of any vestige of his father's charm: In the 
name of the Blessed Cassilda, couldn't he even look at her? It was the scar 
tissue at the corner of his mouth which had drawn his face into a sneer; but he 
had taken it into his very soul, it seemed.
"So Lerrys and Geremy are here? Are they in the hotel?"
"We have a suite here, on the ninetieth floor," Dio said, "but they are in the 
amphitheater, watching a competition in null - gravity dancing. Lerrys is an 
ama­teur of the sport, but he was eliminated early in the competition, when he 
twisted a muscle in his knee and the medics would not allow him to continue."
Kennard bowed. "Convey them both my compli­ments," he said, "and my invitation, 
lady, for the three of you to be my guests tomorrow night, when the finalists 
perform in the amphitheater here."
"I am sure they will be charmed," Dio said, and took her leave.
She heard the rest of the story that evening from her brothers.
"Lew? That was the traitor," Geremy said. "Went' to Aldaran as his father's 
envoy and sold Kennard out, to join up with those pirates and bandits at 
Aldaran. His mother's people, after all, and believe me, Aldaran blood isn't to 
be trusted. They had some kind of super - matrix back there, and young Aldaran 
was ex­perimenting with it. Burned down half of Caer Donn when the thing got out 
of hand. I heard Lew switched sides again, joining up with one of those hill - 
woman bitches, one of Aldaran's bastard daughters, I heard, and sold out Aldaran 
like he sold out the rest of us; and got his hand burned off. Serves him right, 
too. But I guess Kennard couldn't admit what a mistake he'd made, after all he 
went through to get Lew declared his heir. Did they manage to regenerate his 
hands?" Geremy wriggled the three fingers lost in a duel, years ago, and 
regenerated, regrown good as new by Empire medics. "No? Maybe old Kennard 
thought he ought to have something to remember his treachery by."
"No," Lerrys said, "you have it wrong way round, Geremy. Lew's not a bad chap. 
He did his damned­est, so I heard, to control the fire - image when it got out 
of hand; and the girl died. I heard he'd married her. One of the monitors of 
Arilinn told me how hard they worked to save her, and to save Lew's hand; but 
the girl was too far gone, and Lew - " He shrugged. "Zandru's hells, what a 
thing to face! Lew was one of the most powerful telepaths they ever had at 
Arilinn, I heard; but I knew him best in the cadets. Quiet fellow, standoffish 
if anything; but he had to put up with a lot of trouble from people who felt he 
had no right to be there, and I think it warped him. Good enough in his own way, 
though. I liked him, though he was touchy as the devil, and like a monk in some 
ways." He grinned. "He had so little to do with women that I made the mistake of 
thinking he was one of my kind, and made him a certain proposal. Oh, he didn't 
say much. But I never asked him that again!" Lerrys chuckled. "I'll wager he 
didn't give you a kind word, either? That's a new thing for you, isn't it, 
little sister, to meet a man who's not at your feet within a few minutes?" 
Teasing, he chucked her under the chin.
Dio said pettishly, "I didn't like him. I hope he stays far away from me!"
"Oh, you could do worse," Geremy mused. "After all, he is Heir to Alton; and 
Kennard's old and lame and probably not long for this life. How would you like 
to be Lady of Alton, sister?"
"No." Lerrys put a protective arm around her. "We can do better than that for 
Dio. Council will never accept him, after that Sharra business. Ken forced them 
to accept Lew, but they never accepted his other son, though young Marius is 
worth two of Lew; and once Kennard's gone, they'll look elsewhere for some­one 
to inherit the Domain of Alton. No, Dio - " Gently, he turned her around to look 
at him. "I know, there aren't many young men of your caste here, and Lew's 
Darkovan, and, I suppose, handsome as women think of these things. But stay away 
from him. Be polite, but keep your distance. I like him, in a way, but he's 
trouble."
"You needn't worry about that," Dio said. "I can't stand the sight of him."
Yet, inside where it hurt, she felt a pained wonder. She thought of the unknown 
girl Lew had married, who had died to save them all from the unknown menace of 
the fire - Goddess. So it had been Lew who raised the fires, then, and suffered 
in order to quench them again? She felt herself shiver in dread and terror. What 
must his memories be like, what nightmares must he live, night and day! Perhaps 
it was no wonder that he walked apart, scowling, and could give no one a kind 
word or a smile!
Around the ring of the null - gravity field, small crystalline tables were 
suspended in midair; their seats apparently hanging from jeweled chains of 
stars. Actu­ally, they were all surrounded by energy - nets, so that even if a 
diner fell out of his chair (and where the wine and spirits flowed so freely, 
some of them did) he would not fall; but the illusion was breathtaking, 
bring­ing a momentary look of wonder and interest even to Lew's closed face.
Kennard Alton was a generous and gracious host; he had commanded seats at the 
very edge of the gravity ring, and sent for the finest of wines and deli­cacies; 
they sat suspended over the starry gulf, watch­ing the gravity - free dancers 
whirling and spinning across the void below them, soaring like birds in free 
flight. Dio sat at Kennard's right hand, across from Lew, who, after that first 
flash of reaction to the illusion of far space, sat silent, motionless, his 
scarred and frown­ing face oblivious; past them galaxies flamed and flowed and 
the dancers, half - naked in spangles and loose veils, flew like exotic birds, 
soaring on the star - streams. His right hand - evidently artificial and 
motionless - lay on the table, unstirring, encased in a black glove. That 
unmoving hand made Dio uncomfortable; the empty sleeve had seemed somehow more 
honest.
Only Lerrys was really at ease, greeting Lew with a touch of real cordiality; 
but Lew replied only in mono­syllables, and even Lerrys finally tired of trying 
to force conversation, and bent over the gulf of dancers, studying the finalists 
with unfeigned envy, comment­ing on the skills, or lack of them, of the 
performers. Dio knew he wished he was among them.
When the winners had been chosen and the prizes awarded, the gravity was turned 
on, and the tables drifted in spiral orbits, down to the floor. Music began to 
play, and dancers moved onto the ballroom surface, glittering and transparent, 
as if they danced on the same gulf where the gravity - dancers had whirled in 
free - soaring flight. Lew murmured something about leaving, but Kennard called 
for more drinks, and un­der the confusion Dio heard him sharply reprimanding 
Lew; all she heard was, " Damn it, you can't hide forever!"
Lerrys rose and slipped away; a little later they saw him moving onto the dance 
floor with an exquisite woman whom they recognized as one of the dance 
performers, in starry blue now covered with drifts of silvery gauze.
"How well he dances," Kennard said genially. "A pity he had to withdraw from the 
competition, though it hardly seems fitting to a Comyn lord - "
"Comyn means nothing here," Geremy laughed, "and that is why we come here, to do 
things unbefit­ting Comyn dignity on our own world! Come, wasn't that why you 
came here, kinsman, for adventures which might be unseemly or worse in the 
Domains?"
Dio was watching the dancers, envious. Perhaps Lerrys would come back and dance 
with her. But she saw that the woman dancer, perhaps recognizing him as the 
finalist who had had to withdraw, perhaps sim­ply impressed by his dancing, had 
carried him off to talk to the other finalists, and now Lerrys was talking 
intimately with a young, handsome lad, his red head bent close to the boy's. The 
dancer was clad only in nets of gilt thread and the barest possible gilt patches 
for decency; his hair was dyed a striking blue. It was doubtful, now, that he 
remembered that there were such creatures as women in existence, far less 
sisters.
Kennard, watching the direction of her glance, said, "I have not been able to 
dance for many years, Lady Dio, or I would give myself the pleasure; I can see 
you are longing to be with the dancers. And it is small pleasure to a young 
maiden to dance with her brothers, as I have heard my foster sisters and now my 
foster daughters complain. But you are too young to dance in such a public place 
as this except with kinsmen - "
Dio tossed her head, setting her fair curls flying. She said, "I do as I please, 
Lord Alton, here on Vainwal!" Then, seized by some imp of boredom or mischief, 
she turned to the scowling Lew. "Will you dance with me, cousin?"
He raised his head and glared at her; Dio quailed, wishing she had not started 
this. This was no one to flirt with, to exchange light pleasantries! He gave her 
a glance of pure hate; but even so, he was shoving back his chair.
"As you wish, cousin. If you will do me the kind­ness." His harsh voice was 
amiable, even friendly - if you did not see the look deep in his eyes. It 
hardened Dio's resolve. Damn him, this was arrogance! He was not the only 
crippled man in the universe, nor on this planet, nor even in the room - his own 
father could hardly put one foot before the other, and made no bones about 
saying so!
He held out his good arm to her. "You will have to forgive me if I step on your 
feet. I have not danced in many years. It is not a skill much valued on Terra, 
and my years there were spent mostly in different hospitals."
He did not step on her feet, though. He moved as lightly as a drift of wind, and 
after a very little time, Dio gave herself up to the music and the pure 
enjoy­ment of the dance. They were well - matched, and sifter a few minutes of 
moving together in the perfect match­ing of the rhythm - she knew she was 
dancing with a Darkovan, nowhere else in the civilized Empire did any people 
place so much emphasis on dancing as did the Darkovan culture - she raised her 
eyes and smiled at him, lowering mental barriers in a way any Comyn would have 
known to be an invitation for the tele­pathic touch of their caste.
For the barest instant, his eyes met hers, and she sensed him reach out to her, 
as if by instinct, attuned to the sympathy between their moving bodies; then the 
barriers slammed down between them, hard, leav­ing her breathless with the shock 
of the rebuff. It took all her self - control not to cry out with the pain of 
that rebuff, but she would not give him the satisfaction of knowing he had hurt 
her; she simply smiled and went on dancing at the ordinary level, enjoying the 
move­ment, the sense of being perfectly in tune with his steps.
But, inside, she was dazed and bewildered. What had she done to merit such a 
rebuff? Nothing, cer­tainly; her gesture had been bold, indeed, but not 
indecently so. He was, after all, a man of her own caste, a telepath and a 
kinsman. So, since she had done nothing to deserve it, it must have been made in 
response to his own inner turmoil, and had nothing to do with her at all.
So, she went on smiling, and when the dance slowed to a softer, more romantic 
movement, and the dancers around them were moving closer, cheek against cheek, 
almost embracing, she moved instinctively toward him. For an instant he went 
stiff and she wondered if he would violently reject the physical touch, too; but 
she moved instinctively toward him, and after a moment his arm tightened around 
her. Through the very touch, though his mental defenses were locked tight, she 
sensed the starved hunger in him. How long had it been, she wondered, since he 
had touched a woman? Far too long, she was sure of that. The telepath Comyn, 
particularly the Alton and Ridenow, were well - known for their fastidiousness 
in such matters; they were hy­persensitive, much too aware of the random or 
casual touch. Not many of the Comyn were capable of toler­ating casual love 
affairs.
The dance slowed, the lights dimming, and she sensed that all around them 
couples were moving into one another's arms. A miasma of sensuality seemed to 
lie over the whole room, almost visible. Lew held her tight against him, bending 
his head, and she raised her face to him, again inviting the touch he had 
rebuffed.
He did not lower his mental barriers, but their lips touched, and Dio felt a 
slow, drowsy excitement climb­ing in her and they kissed. When they drew apart 
his lips smiled, but there was still a great sadness behind his eyes.
He looked around the great room filled with danc­ing couples, many now entwined 
in close embrace. "This - this is decadent," he said.
She smiled, snuggling closer to him. "Surely no more than midsummer - festival 
in the streets of Then - dara. I am not too young to know what goes on when the 
moons have set."
His harsh voice sounded gentler than usual. "Your brothers would call me out and 
challenge me to a duel."
She lifted her chin angrily. "We are not in the Kilghard Hills! Lew Alton, I do 
not allow any other person, even a brother, to tell me what 1 may or may not do! 
If my brothers disapprove of my conduct, they may come to me for an accounting 
of it, not to you!"
He laughed, and with his good hand touched the feathery edges of her short fair 
hair. It was, she thought, a beautiful hand, sensitive and strong without being 
over - delicate. "So you have cut your hair and taken on the independence of a 
Free Amazon? Have you taken their oath too, cousin?"
"No," she said, snuggling close to him again. "I am too fond of men ever to do 
that." When he smiled, she thought he was very handsome; even the scar that drew 
his lip tight only gave his smile a little more irony and warmth.
They danced together much of the evening, and before they parted, agreed to meet 
the next day for a hunt in the great hunting preserves of Vainwal. When they 
said goodnight, Kennard was smiling benevo­lently, but Geremy was sullen and 
brooding, and when the three of them were alone in their luxurious suite, he 
demanded wrathfully, "Why did you do that? I told you, stay away from Lew! We 
don't really want an entanglement with that branch of the Altons!"
"How dare you try and tell me who I can dance with? Or, if I choose, who I can 
make love with? I don't censure your choice of entertainers and singing - women 
and whores, do I?"
"You are a lady of the Comyn. When you behave so blatantly - "
"Hold your tongue!" Dio flared at him, "You are insulting! I dance one evening 
with a man of my own caste, because my brothers left me no one else to dance 
with, and you already have me bedded down with him! Geremy, I will tell you once 
again, I do what I wish, and neither you nor any other man can stop me!"
"Lerrys," Geremy appealed, "can you reason with her?"
But Lerrys stood regarding his sister with admira­tion. "That's the spirit, Dio. 
What is the good of being in an alien world in a civilized Empire if you keep 
the provincial spirit and customs of your backwater? Do what you wish, Dio. 
Geremy, let her alone!"
Geremy shook his head, laughing. "You two! Al­ways one in mind, as if you had 
been born twins!"
"Certainly," Lerrys said. "Why, do you think, am I a lover of men? Because, to 
my ill - fortune, the only woman I have ever known with a man's spirit and a 
man's strength is my own sister." He kissed her, laugh­ing. "Enjoy yourself, 
breda, but don't get hurt. He may have been in a romantic mood tonight, but he 
could be savage, I suspect."
"No." Suddenly Geremy was sober. "This is no joke. I don't want you to see him 
again, Diotima. One evening, perhaps to do courtesy to our kinsman; I grant you 
that, and I am sorry if I implied there was more than courtesy. But no more, 
Dio, not again. There are enough men on this world, to dance with, flirt with, 
hunt with - yes, damn it, and bed down with if that should be your will! But let 
Kennard Alton's damned half - caste bastard alone - do you hear? I tell you, if 
you disobey me, I shall make you both regret it! 
"Now," said Lerrys, still laughing, as Dio tossed her head in defiance, "You 
have made it sure that she will see him again, Geremy; you have all but spread 
the bridal bed for them! Don't you know that no man can forbid Dio to do 
anything?"
In the hunting preserve the next day, they chose horses, and the great hawks not 
unlike the verrin hawks of the Kilghard Hills. Lew was smiling and good - 
natured, but she sensed that he was just a little shocked, too, at her riding 
breeches and boots. "So you are the Amazon you said you were not, after all?" he 
teased, and she smiled back into his eyes and said, "No; I told you why I could 
never be an Amazon, and the more I see of you, the more certain I am of that."
He was a good rider, although the lifeless artificial hand seemed to be very 
much in his way, and she wondered if he could not, after all, have managed 
better one - handed. She would have thought that even a metal hook would have 
been better, if they could not, for some reason, regrow the hand. But perhaps he 
was too proud for that, or feared she would think it ugly. He carried the hawk 
on a special saddle - block, as women did, rather than holding it on his wrist 
as most Darkovan men chose to do, and when she looked at it he colored and 
turned angrily away, swearing under his breath. Again Dio thought, with that 
sudden anger which he seemed able to rouse in her so swiftly, Why is he so 
sensitive and self - indulgent about it? What arrogance! Does he think I really 
care whether he has two hands, or one, or three?
The hunting preserve had been carefully landscaped and terraformed to beautiful 
and varied scenery, low hills which did not strain the horses, smooth plains, a 
variety of wildlife, colorful vegetation from a dozen worlds. But as they rode 
she heard him sigh a little. He said, just loud enough for her to hear, "It is 
beautiful here. But I wish I were in the Domains. The sun here is - is wrong, 
somehow.
"Are you homesick, Lew?" she asked.
He tightened his mouth. "Yes. Sometimes," he said, but he had slammed down his 
defenses again, and Oio turned back to attend to the hawk on her saddle.
The preserve was stocked with a variety of game, large and small; after a time 
they let their hawks loose: Dio watched in delight as hers soared high, wheeled 
in midair and set off on long strong wings after a flight of small white birds, 
directly overhead. Lew's hawk came after, swiftly stooping, striking at one of 
the small birds, seizing it in midair. The white bird struggled pitifully, with 
a long eerie scream. Dio had hunted with hawks all her life, and watched with 
interest, but as drops of blood fell from the dying bird, spattering them, she 
realized that Lew's face was drawn with horror; he looked paralyzed.
"Lew, what is the matter?"
He said, his voice strained and hoarse, "That sound - I cannot bear it - " and 
flung up his two arms over his eyes, the black - gloved artificial hand striking 
his forehead hard and awkwardly; searing, he wrenched it off his wrist and flung 
it to the ground under his horse's hooves.
"No, it's not pretty," he mocked, in a rage, "like blood, and death, and the 
screams of dying things! If you take pleasure in them, so much the worse for 
you, lady! Take pleasure, then, in this - !" He held up the hideously scarred 
bare stump, shaking it in fury at her; then he wheeled his horse, jerking at the 
reins with his good hand, and riding off as if all the devils in all the hells 
were chasing him.
Dio stared in dismay; then, forgetting the hawks, set after him at a breakneck 
gallop. After a time they came abreast; he was fighting the reins with his one 
hand, struggling to rein in the mount; but as she watched in horror, he lost 
control and was tossed out of his saddle, coming heavily to the ground to lie 
there senseless and stunned.
Dio slid from her horse and knelt at his side. He had been knocked unconscious, 
but while she was trying to decide if she should go bring help, he opened his 
eyes and looked at her without recognition.
"It's all right," she said, "the horse threw you. Can you sit up?"
"Yes, of course." He sat up awkwardly, as if the stump pained him, wincing; then 
saw it, colored and tried to thrust it quickly into a fold of his riding cloak, 
out of sight.
"It's all right, Lew, you don't have to hide. . . ."
He turned his face away from her, and the taut scar tissue drew up his mouth as 
if he were ready to cry. "Oh, God, I'm sorry, I didn't mean . . ."
"What was it, Lew? Why did you lose your temper like that?"
Dazed, he shook his head. "I - I cannot bear the sight of blood, now, or the 
thought of some small helpless thing dying for my pleasure," he said, and his 
voice sounded exhausted. "I heard the little white bird crying, and I saw the 
blood, and I remembered - Oh God, I remembered - Dio, go away, don't, don't, in 
the name of the merciful Evanda, Dio, don't - " His face twisted again and he 
was weeping, his face ugly and crumpled, turning away so that she would not see, 
trying to choke back the hoarse painful sobs. "I have seen ... too much pain . . 
. Dio, don't . . .."
She put out her arms, folded him in them, drawing him against her breast. He 
resisted, for a moment, frantically, then let the woman draw him close. She was 
crying, too.
"I never thought," she whispered. "Death in hunt­ing, I am so used to it, it 
never seemed quite real to me. Lew, what was it, who died, what happened, what 
did it make you remember?"
"She was my wife," he said hoarsely, "my wife, bearing our child. And she died, 
died horribly in Sharra's fires - Dio, don't touch me, somehow I hurt everyone I 
touch, go away before I hurt you too - I don't want you to be hurt."
She said, "It's too late for that," and he raised his one hand to her face, 
touching her eyes. She felt him slam down his defenses again, but this time she 
knew it was not the rebuff she feared, only the defense of a man unimaginably 
hurt, a man who could endure no more.
"Were you hurt?" he said, his hand lingering on her wet eyes, on her cheeks. 
"There is blood on your face."
"It's the bird's blood. It's on you too," she said, and wiped it away. He took 
her hand in his and pressed the fingertips to his lips. Somehow, the gesture 
made her want to cry again, and she asked, "Were you hurt when you fell?"
"Not much." He sat up, testing his muscles. They taught me, in the Empire 
hospital on Terra, how to fall without hurting myself, when I was . . . before 
this healed." Uneasily, he moved the stump. "I can't get used to the damned 
hand, though. I can do better one - handed."
"Why do you wear it, then? Do you think I would care?"
His face was bleak. "Father would care. He thinks when I wear the empty sleeve I 
am making a show of my lameness. He hates his own so much. I would rather not - 
not flaunt mine at him."
Dio thought swiftly, then decided what she could say. "It seems to me that you 
are a grown man, and need not consult your father about your own arm and hand."
He sighed, nodded. "But he has been so good to me, never reproached me for these 
years of exile, and the way in which his own plans had been brought to nothing. 
I do not want to distress him." He rose, went to collect the grotesque, lifeless 
thing in its black glove. He put it away in the saddlebag, and fumbled one - 
handed to pin the sleeve over the stump. She started, matter-of-factly, to offer 
help, then decided it was too soon for that. He looked into the sky and said, "I 
suppose the hawks are gone beyond recall and we will be charged for losing 
them."
"No." She blew the silver whistle around her neck. "They are birds with brains 
modified, so they cannot choose but come to the whistle . . . see?" She pointed 
as they spiraled down and landed, standing patiently on the saddle blocks, 
awaiting their hoods: "Their instinct for freedom has been burnt out."
"They are like some men I know" said Lew, slip­ping the hood on his hawk. But 
neither of them moved to mount. Dio hesitated, then decided he had proba­bly had 
enough of politely averted eyes and pretenses of courteous unawareness. "Do you 
need help to mount? Can I help you, or shall I fetch someone who can?"
"Thank you, but I can manage, though it looks awkward." Again, suddenly he 
smiled, and his ugly scarred face seemed handsome again to her. "How did you 
know it would do me good to hear that said?"
"I have always been very strong. But I think if I were hurt I would not want 
people to pretend every­thing was exactly the same and perfectly normal. Please 
don't ever pretend with me, Lew." And then she asked, "I have wanted to know. 
Don't tell me if you don't want to, I'm not trying to pry. But - Geremy lost 
three fingers in a duel. The Terran medics re - grew them, just as they were 
before. Why did they not do that with your hand?"
"They - tried," he said. "Twice. Then I could - could bear no more. Somehow, the 
pattern of the cells - you are not a matrix technician, are you? I wonder if you 
can understand . . . the pattern of the cells, the - the knowledge in the cells, 
which makes a hand a hand, and not a finger or an eye or a bird's wing, had been 
damaged beyond renewing, and what grew on my wrist was - was a horror. I - when 
I woke from the drugs, just once, and saw, I - I screamed my throat raw; my 
voice will never be right again, either; for half a year I could only whisper. I 
was not myself for - for years. I can live with it, now, because I must. I can 
face the knowledge that I am - am maimed. What I cannot face," he said with 
sudden violence, "is my father's pretense that I am - am whole!"
Dio felt sudden violent anger. So even the father could not face the reality of 
what had happened to his son! Could not even face the son's need to face what 
had happened to him. She said, voice low, "Don't ever think you have to pretend 
to me, Lew Alton."
He seized her in a rough grip, dragged her close. It was hardly an embrace. He 
said, in that hoarse voice, "Girl, do you know what you are saying? You can't 
know!"
She said, shaking, "If you can endure what you have endured, I can bear to know 
what it is that you have had to suffer. Lew, let me prove that to you!"
In the back of her mind she wondered, why am I doing this? But she knew that 
when they had come into each other's arms on the dancing floor, last night, even 
behind the barriers of Lew's locked defenses, their bodies had somehow made a 
pact. Barricade themselves from one another as they would, some­thing in each of 
them had reached out to the other and accepted what the other was, wholly and 
forever.
She raised her face to .him. His arms went around her in grateful surprise, and 
he murmured, still hold­ing back, "But you are so young, chiya, you can't know 
... I should be horsewhipped for this, but it has been so long, so long ..." and 
she knew he was not speaking of the obvious. She felt herself dissolve in total 
awareness of him, the receding barriers, the memory of pain and horror, the 
starved sexuality, the ordeals which had gone on beyond human endurance; the 
black and encompassing horror of guilt, of a loved one dead, self - knowledge, 
blame, mutilation, guilt at living on when the beloved was dead. . . .
In a desperate, hungering endurance, she clasped him closer, knowing it was this 
for which he had longed most, someone who could touch him without pretense, 
accept his suffering, love him nevertheless. For an instant she saw herself 
reflected in his mind, not recognizing, glowing with tenderness, warm, woman, 
and for a moment loved herself for what she had become to him; then the contact 
broke and receded like a tide, leaving her awed, shaken, leaving tears and 
tenderness that could never grow less. Only then did he kiss her; and as she 
laughed and accepted the kiss she said in a whisper, "Geremy was right."
"What, Dio?"
"Nothing," she said, light - hearted with relief. "Come, love, the hawks are 
restless and we must get them back to their mews. We will have our fee refunded 
because we have claimed no kill, but I for one have had full value for my hunt. 
I have captured what I most wanted."
"And what is that?" he asked, teasing, but she knew he did not need an answer. 
He was not touching her now, as they mounted, but she knew that some­how they 
were still touching, still embraced.
He flung up his empty sleeve in a laughing gesture. "Come on," he called, "we 
may as well have a ride, at least! Which of us will be first at the stables?"
And he was off, Dio after him, laughing. She knew as well as he how this day 
would end. And it was only the beginning of a long season on Vainwal.
It would be a beautiful summer.
(1980)