Beowulf's Children
Chapter 16

THREE SEDUCTIONS

The surest way to prevent seditions (if the times do bear it) is to take away the matter of them.
-FRANCIS BACON, Essays

    Weeks passed, and a semblance of normality returned to the colony. The Star Born mostly brooded at Surf's Up and avoided interacting with the Earth Born. Justin stayed at the Bluff. When Jessica came home from Surf's Up, she rarely spoke to her parents, although Cadmann tried to reach out to her.
    Then, on a day when Geographic's satellites warned that storm clouds were sweeping in from the mainland, Jessica called her father to ask if she could come for dinner.
    There was no mention of any of the unpleasantness during the call. In fact, there had been little public protest of Zack's proclamation. And that, in itself, should have warned them.

    Ruth Moskowitz adjusted her chamel's harness for a little more give around the shoulders. The beast's name was Tarzan. All six of the tamed chamels were males. The females were too large and irritable to domesticate, and they'd only captured one before the expeditions into the forests northeast of Deadwood Pass had ceased.
    Male chamels were horse-size and had the exaggerated grace of a praying mantis. They were intelligent and fast, with excellent pack instincts. Only three of them were really tamed, but there was every evidence that Tarzan and the other two might be just the first of thousands. There were some very special reasons why tamed chamels might be ideal hunting mounts.
    Ruth had never seen a kangaroo, although the Chakas were thinking of developing one from the fertilized ova banks, but Tarzan reminded her of those in Cassandra's pictures. Tarzan looked like a kangaroo with feathery antennae and stronger forelegs. He was tan with a greenish tinge, but his back was changing color even now to match Ruth's blue denim outfit.
    Tarzan balanced himself on his strong hind legs and reached around to snap at her irritably. She tugged her reins expertly, and spurred him with heels to the ribs. He whistled in exasperation and galloped around the corral for the fiftieth time that day.
    She wove him in between carefully spaced stakes, wheeled him, jumped him first over a low gate and then over one three feet in height. They were into high golden grass now, and Tarzan's coat was turning to gold.
    Chamels jumped oddly. They would hit the ground, sink, seem to pause for an instant, and then unwind from that deep crouch and spring into the air as if from a standing position. Their hind legs were so powerful that they landed with no shock at all. She loved Tarzan, and everything about training him.
    She and Tarzan were getting into a rhythm now, speeding around the quarter-mile perimeter exhilaratingly fast, occasionally dipping into the center of the pen to try weaving and jumping maneuvers.
    She was so caught up in her work that at first she did not notice a flat, regular clapping sound. Flushed and sweating, she turned in the saddle to see Aaron Tragon, mounted on a gray horse, just the other side of the gate. 
    "Bravo," he said, striking his palms together.
    She smiled shyly, and trotted Tarzan over to him. Aaron's horse was a mare, a quarter horse named Zodiac with a raucous disposition. The mare tossed her mottled head and eyed Tarzan suspiciously. Horses and chamels existed in an uneasy truce at best.
    "You're really bringing him along," Aaron said. His golden hair was tied back in a ponytail, and he wore a loose buccaneer-style shirt cut almost to the navel, crisscrossed with leather thongs. His lips were half opened in a lazy smile.
    "What brings you out this way?" Ruth asked. "I thought you were out at Surf's Up." 
    "Man does not live by wave alone," he laughed. "So what brings you here?"
    He looked at her for about thirty seconds without speaking, and Ruth felt her cheeks start to burn. She had to look away.
    "To tell you the truth, I just wanted to ask you on a picnic."
    She snapped her head up. Her throat felt constricted. "Me?"
    "Sure. We had a great catch last week, and we've smoked it. I made fresh bread last night, and I have enough sandwiches for a small army. You look hungry enough for a division."
    She felt her heart speed up, had the terrible, crazy thought that she must be dreaming. She felt as if she were falling down a deep well, and made a powerful effort of will to bring herself up sharp.
    "Well?" he asked. There was a world of insinuation in his question. His eyes twinkled. "I tell you what," he said. "I'll race you to the grove."
    "Winner?" she asked.
    "Takes all," he answered, and her cheeks burned again.

    Edgar Sikes slept alone in his room off the main communications center. He had another domicile, out at Surf's Up, but spent little time there. Most of his personal possessions--such as they were-were here in his little cubbyhole. It was cluttered and overstuffed. He rarely had visitors. Most of the time he was in the computer center, or in his room reading. He'd been reading a James Bond metabook when he went to sleep.
    Something hit his door three times, hard enough to rattle it. He sat up with visions of SMERSH assassins dancing through his head.
    Trish Chance was an impressive sight. Five foot ten of brown-skinned feminine muscle, her body was almost-but not quite-a parody of the female form. When he opened the door she brushed past him, buttocks sliding pleasantly past his, as if she were dancing with an inexpert partner. She turned as if posing. The muscles in her arms and shoulders shifted and separated like the coils of a spring.
    In the crowded environs of this room, she was damned near overpowering. The only girl who had shared a bed with Edgar Sikes, once and nevermore. She smiled at him, and closed the door behind her.
    She wore a formfitting pair of black denims, and a white ruffled shirt so tight across the chest that her breasts threatened to explode through the cloth. She smiled at him, lips curling up at the corners like those of a jungle eat who has spotted something extremely edible.
    Edgar's throat tightened until he could barely swallow. "Ah-hi Trish," he said, startled by his own daring. Why was she looking at him like that?
    She crossed the room to sit beside him on his narrow cot. It creaked at their combined weight. He sat too, and her thigh was only an inch from his. She wore some kind of sweet, musky oiled essence. Her skin had a soft, almost golden sheen in the dim light.
    Trish was part of Aaron's inner circle. What was she doing here? "Is there something I can . . . do for you?"
    In answer she leaned forward. What happened next was so shocking, and so powerful, that when she finally pulled back it took almost a full minute for his brain to get back into gear. He had never been kissed like that. His experience with kissing-or anything else to do with women-was scant. Yet and still he would have wagered either kidney that no more thorough kiss had ever been given-or gratefully received--in the history of the universe.
    He leaned forward urgently, hands questing for something to hold on to-preferably Trish's extraordinary breasts. She held him away gently but firmly. In that instant he verified what he had always suspected-that Trish was much stronger than he. Why didn't that make him less a man?
    Because his masculinity was so painfully self-evident that it could have withstood anything short of a hurricane without withering noticeably; and because Trish was saying, "You're going to get everything that you want-and more." Her hand slid between his legs. She started a silky stroking movement.
    He whined. He hated to hear the sound of it coming from his own throat, but undeniably, there it was. Oh, God-he hoped he didn't start to whimper and beg.
    "Please . . ." he whimpered. Maybe strong women liked whimpering. He was in a state to try anything. Dammit, she wouldn't let him any closer. If she kept stroking like that, in another moment it wasn't going to make any differ-
    She stopped, fingertips still touching. He felt like a violin string in the last moments of a Vivaldi concerto. A weird notion danced through his head: that Trish in his room was some last legacy from what he could not cease to remember as a neat array of clean bones . . . from the woman who would have been his father's wife. For just this once, for Linda, he would believe in life after death.
    "First," she said softly. "First I need to know what kind of man you are."
    "Whatever kind you want," he said, and believed he meant it.
    "I want to know," she said, and her eyes bored into him. "I want to know if you're the kind who believes in revenge."
    He withered. She couldn't know why; and he was thinking again. Not Linda. Aaron must have sent her; nothing else could have. And Edgar Sikes did believe in revenge.
    Oh God. Her hand felt so good. She smelled so good. It had been so long. He pulled back a little to see her face. 
    "Yes," he said. On Aaron Tragon!
    "Good," she said, and began to unbutton her blouse. "There's something that Aaron wants you to do." 
    "Aaron . . . ?" he asked inanely. But then she had bent him back flat on the bed, and her hands were unbuckling his belt with practiced precision, and her left nipple was in his mouth. And all he could think of was: I'll believe in the Tooth Fairy, or the Easter Bunny, or Dianetics . . . but not in Aaron Tragon. But Trish, Trish, you don't have to know that! Not ever.

    She knew it. Ruth could see that. Aaron was reining Zodiac back, letting her win. Chamels weren't quite as fast as horses, and Aaron was a fine horseman, but by the time they were halfway across the plowed field, she knew that she was going to win.
    She knew it. Knew it! Well, whatever his little joke was, she was going to get full measure of satisfaction from her victory. She'd make him take her to one of the notorious Surf's Up bashes, that's what she'd do. She would arrive with him, on his arm-
    "Hiyahhh!" She looked around, and saw that Aaron had suddenly stopped playing, he was letting Zodiac have her way, and the mare was charging powerfully, head down, feet digging into the soil and ripping up great clots of earth, Aaron bent into the saddle, urging the quarterhorse on and on.
    Ruth heard a little yip of fright escape her throat. For a time Tarzan kept his lead, and then Aaron slipped past her just as they entered the shadow of the grove, and she had lost.
    She reared Tarzan around, and brought him to a halt. One thing at least-chamels could change direction or stop faster than horses. She slipped down his back and patted his muzzle, calming him, stroked the great, trembling hind legs. Tarzan stretched and folded down into a sitting position. Where shadows dappled his back, his color had begun to change. 
    Aaron returned on foot, leading Zodiac by the reins.
    "You know," he said, "I think that chamels will actually be better for hunting than horses. They're more flexible in the brush." 
    "And almost as fast on the straight," she said.
    He was very close to her. God, her whole body was shaking. She wasn't certain that they had ever been this close together. Not alone, anyway. He was breathing very hard, and sweating. His sweat smelled very . . . male.
    "So," she said, a little frightened by her own daring. "Exactly what reward do you claim?"
    He leaned nearer until she thought that he was going to kiss her. She moistened her lips, and tilted her face up, and when his face was only an inch away, he said: "I want you to serve the food."
    She felt her face drop, her entire body freeze with disappointment.
    Then he added: "First."

    They spread the picnic blanket. Aaron handed her his backpack.
    Her hands were shaking. She was trying so hard to do everything perfectly, to bring a dancer's grace to every tiny motion. But every part of her was too aware that he was watching, every inch of her skin was too sensitive, felt his touch even though they were separated by feet. She kept speeding up, and he, with infinite patience, kept reminding her to slow down.
    "We have all the time in the world," he said.
    She set out the carefully packed plates, and the carefully wrapped food, and the carefully wrapped utensils. "Slowly," he said. "You have to make sure that everything is in its place. Everything is exactly where it needs to be." 
    She nodded, feeling feverishly hot.
    They ate. There was no moment when his eyes met hers, and she wanted to scream, wanted to throw the food down and throw herself into his arms, wanted to feel his lips and hands and tongue all over her body, just like she'd read in the books, seen in the holos. She longed to do the same for him. Please God, please, let this be the time, now, here . . .
    But her silent pleas went unheard. He continued to concentrate on his food, eating as slowly and carefully as if it were a tea party.
    She watched his hands. So large and strong. They moved with such certainty. Such strength. Hands like that could do anything, could take anything that they wanted. 
    She thought she was going to die. Please . . . 
    "Excuse me." He broke the silence for the first time in five agonizing minutes. 
    touch . . . 
    "Would you hand me the butter?" 
    me. I love you so . . .
    She nodded silently, and grasped the small platter, extending it to him. His hand reached out, and their fingers met.
    And their eyes. And she was falling forward. 
    And then their lips.
    And then it was everything, every moment she had hoped for, so exhilarating that even the brief, sharp pain as he eased into her only increased the impact as dream crossed over into reality. A fierce, tender, laughing, tearful, all consuming experience.
    His lips and tongue. And God, his hands. So gentle. So strong.
    Hands like his could do anything. Take anything they wanted.
    She thought she was going to die.

    Trish Chance was bored. Aaron had a plan, sure he did, but right now his plan was to do nothing . . . and meanwhile they were trapped on the island, unable to go to the mainland, under suspicion but forced to be polite to the First.
    Trish left the comm shack wearing a wide grin. Smile and smile and be a villain, she thought. She didn't have to spend all her hours sulking. Edgar was an eager student-and so grateful, too. And everyone was so surprised! The comm shack was centrally located, which meant it was near everyone's place, and if Trish kept visiting Edgar everyone on the island was going to know it.
    Her grin faded when she saw Carolyn McAndrews approaching with a purposeful look. Carolyn had tried to adopt Trish in the early days, when no one was quite sure how to raise the Bottle Babies. Trish had been ten years old, and eager to have a permanent home rather than the communal nursery. But not that eager, not in that home. 
    Now Carolyn was coming at her. "Trish!" she called. 
    Trish slowed, hoisted a smile into place. "Hi, Carolyn." 
    "Have you got a minute to talk?" 
    "Sure. What's up?"
    Carolyn quieted as Julia Hortha and Manny Halperin strolled past in deep conversation. When they were out of earshot, she said, "I'm sorry things didn't work out for us, earlier-"
    "It was along time ago, Carolyn, and you had your own children to take care of. I can't blame you for putting them first."
    "Did I? I suppose I did," Carolyn said. "It comes of-of living alone. Trish, I think you've fallen into a-well, a kind of role."
    "A role?" Trish was genuinely puzzled. "What kind of role?"
    "You and Edgar. And before that, Derik, and Terry-you were their first, sort of the Initiator."
    Trish giggled. "I guess I kind of fell into that, yes. Edgar too." Her smile went exotic and mysterious. She assumed a thick and flagrantly faux accent. "I like to teach the young ones zee arts of love."
    She laughed, then let it die when Carolyn didn't join in. "I did that, Trish. I slept with any man who didn't have a partner. None who did, at least not that I knew of, but a lot of men. And look what it got me." 
    Trish shrugged, genuinely missing the point. 
    "I'm alone, Trish."
    "What do you mean, alone? Everybody likes you." Nobody listens to you, she thought, but who would? Smile and smile-"You're one of the heroes of the Grendel Wars. Carolyn and the horses."
    "Trish, every man would sleep with me, but none of them wanted to take me down the rapids. Now I'm getting old, and no one wants to live with me."
    Sudden understanding. She must think she's my mother. "Oh, that. That's not what I'm looking for, Carolyn." 
    Carolyn grasped her arm. Trish looked at the hand, and decided to let it remain there.
    "Trish, it's a bad thing to be alone. Don't you want to belong to someone? To have someone who belongs to you? You have nothing but casual relationships-" 
    She laughed in Carolyn's face. "In a world with less than five hundred people, there is no such thing as a casual relationship. We're all family."
    "Imagine yourself alone, with no defenders, at my age," said Carolyn.
    Trish was incredulous. "Defenders? Defend from what? Do you think I'm going to starve in the snow without a man to protect me? Nobody starves on Avalon. Nobody goes without. And I'm tougher than I look, lady. I'm stronger than, almost any man here-and men aren't any better at hunting, or producing, or anything else than women are. Didn't you get the word? There was this thing called the Industrial Revolution. That made us equals, that and Zack Moskowitz's grendel guns. And then there was birth control. Maybe your mother forgot to mention it to you." 
    Carolyn smiled, not a thin smile but with genuine warmth. "You might be surprised at what my mother taught me. And Trish, dear, my sister and I did win places on this expedition, and we didn't owe a damn thing to any man for that, either!" 
    "That's the spirit. I have to go now."
    "No, wait, this is important. Trish-it's a terrible thing to be alone-"
    "It's also a terrible thing to have ice on your mind," Trish said, and made as if to leave. Carolyn blocked her path, but Trish knew that she had scored a direct hit, and for the first time felt a tiny trace of remorse. She wiped it from her mind. Who gave her the right to lecture me on morals?
    "I don't seem to be explaining this very well," Carolyn said. "I know they call me a hysteric, but there's more to this than you think." Carolyn struggled for words. "Sometimes hysterics has nothing to do with ice crystals in the brain."
    Change in conversational direction, or change in tactics? "Sure, you can be scared into it. What was it that got you, Carolyn? Grendel fever? Seems to have done it for everyone else."
    "No, not grendels. That was awful, but . . . it was earlier, Trish. When Ernst came out of cold sleep and he was a m-moron, and he barely remembered m-me. And old friends were dropping dead all around me. It turned out half of us were damaged and we couldn't be sure of the rest . . . It was Hibernation Instability. Ice on our minds, we said. We were trying to be polite!" Her eyes defocused, as if she had forgotten she was talking to another person. "We were trying to be polite . . ."
    Trish had heard it before, too many times. This wasn't insulting, it was pitiful, and just plain boring. "Excuse me, Carolyn," she pushed past the older woman. "I'm almost sure I have something to do, somewhere else." 
    "I'm trying to help you," Carolyn said. "You're playing with something you don't understand." 
    "And you do?" 
    "I understand more than you do." 
    "Carolyn, I doubt that."
    "I know you do. When I was your age I was sure I knew everything, too." 
    "And you didn't?" 
    "Of course not."
    "But that was back on Earth. I've watched some of the old Earth dramas. I once did sixty hours straight of 'General Hospital'! That was Earth, Carolyn, and this is Avalon, and life isn't like that anymore!"
    Carolyn laughed. "It never was like that, but never mind. Trish, I know this much. Men and women don't see sex the same way, and that's wired into our brains. It's not something you can ignore just because you want to. Trish, I know."
    "Then I guess I'll just have to find out, won't I? Excuse me-" She brushed past and walked at a fast pace, too fast for Carolyn to catch up without running.
    Behind her Carolyn was still talking to herself. "We'd jumped light-years between stars, the whole universe was ours for the taking, and it was all going wrong. Ice on our minds . . ."

    "More greens?" Mary Ann said, too briskly. A bright and terrible smile had glazed her face during the entire visit. Only when she kept herself busy did it fall away, did a genuine mask of concentration replace it.
    She served her family, bustling about as if work were the only thing that stood between herself and damnation. The very constancy of her motion was an irritant to Jessica. "Mom," she said. "Please. Let me help you."
    Mary Ann turned and her expression was diamond-clear and hard, and just as emotionless. "No. No dear. I think you've done enough, don't you?"
    Cadmann sat next to Justin. Without anyone saying anything explicit, a line had been drawn in the house.
    "I was in the Arboretum earlier," Cadmann said. "I noticed that some of the cacti stems are broken." 
    Jessica shrugged.
    "Do you know anything about that?" 
    "Not particularly." She avoided his eyes.
    "I've been told that a powerful hallucinogen can be produced from its leaves." 
    "Really?"
    "Yes. Katya said that once. I believe that Aaron is the real expert."
    Justin felt his stomach knot. The subject had been approached from a dozen different directions over the past weeks.
    Sylvia was very quiet. Mary Ann had politely but firmly excluded her from most of the kitchen duties. She smiled and whirled, bringing pans of biscuits and rolls and an entire wild turkey to the table. She had worked since morning to prepare everything, and she would probably be clearing the table, washing dishes and cleaning up until after midnight. Then, perhaps, she could fall exhausted into her queen-size bed, and cry herself to sleep. Justin wanted to comfort her, but he couldn't. No one could. Cadmann hadn't slept in her room since the funeral.
    After steaming wedges of French apple pie, Jessica excused herself, and went into the guest bathroom. 
    "It's been good to have you here," Cadmann smiled.
    "That goes for both of us," Sylvia said. She paused. "Has it put any strain . . . ?"
    Justin gave a long, sour exhalation. "Surf's Up is pretty well split right now," he said. "Aaron's kaffeeklatsch has pulled pretty tight. A lot of grumbling." 
    "They'll get over it," Cadmann said. 
    "They think I'm consorting with the enemy." 
    Cadmann laughed. He tamped his pipe down, lit it, and took a long draw. Then he slowly exhaled aromatic smoke. 
    "Everyone makes his own choices," Cadmann said.
    "Except in the sense that Aaron suggested: we didn't decide to come here, and there's no place for us to go. So John Locke's implicit social contract doesn't really apply to us, does it?"
    Cadmann chuckled. "You've been studying again. Damn nuisance, an educated son." He tapped his cigar against the ashtray, and his big sun-browned face wrinkled in exasperation. "Where is that girl?"
    Almost on cue, Jessica reappeared. She smiled uncertainly.
    "Well-it's been lovely. If I'm not mistaken, I hear Aaron's skeeter."
    Mary Ann appeared in the kitchen doorway, apron flapping. "It's a good surprise, seeing you. We'd like it more often."
    "You're always welcome," Sylvia chimed in.
    Mary Ann looked out the dining room window, a vast northern expanse of clear, seamlessly cemented plastic rectangles. The clouds were darker now, and the first drops of rain spattered against the plastic. "Are you sure that you won't stay the night? The storm looks serious." 
    Cadmann nodded. "Cassandra says that it's a big one. The first of the season. There's always a free room. The bunkhouse is available if you and Aaron would like your privacy."
    "No, thank you." She wrapped a woolen shawl around her shoulders. "Justin--are you sure you're staying?" 
    He nodded. "Yeah."
    A decided coolness there. Cadmann thought that she was about to say something, but at the last moment, just smiled.
    The door opened, and big Aaron stood framed by the darkening, cloudy sky.
    He had aged since the return from the mainland. The last of his boyish qualities were gone, replaced by a rangy, impenetrable quality. "Cadmann," he said.
    "Aaron." They shook hands, hard. Aaron's eyes were frozen. Before now, Cadmann had always had a sense of who lived in there, back behind the blue eyes. Now he didn't know. From time to time he wondered if he had ever known. 
    "Are you ready to go?" 
    Jessica nodded.
    Aaron kissed Mary Ann's hand, and held it for an extra moment, gazing into her eyes as if trying to make a connection of some kind.
    Then they were gone.

    The skeeter rose up into the orange-black sky. Tau Ceti was near the horizon, and night would be upon them within minutes.
    "Did you plant it?" Aaron asked. His big square hands were calm and certain upon the controls.
    His hands were always sure, she reflected. Always calm and strong.
    "Yes. It will trigger in-" She looked at her watch. "Eighteen minutes." 
    "I love it when a plan comes together, don't you?" 
    Jessica was silent.
    They swooped down toward the colony.

    Chaka saw the way Edgar's face lit up when he saw Trish Chance. It fell as he saw Chaka in her shadow. Little Chaka smiled and held up a satchel. "Coffee too," he said.
    "Excellent," Edgar said, and ushered them in with wobbly grace. When his head turned away, Trish mimed Chaka a shrug. Did Edgar delude himself that he and Trish would be making the beast with two backs during this critical period?
    Not likely. Aaron had ordered a storm and put it in Edgar's charge. Chaka said, "I'm here in case you run into a glitch. If 'Dragonsnatch' has to be aborted, I'm one of the not-many who can do that. Got an outlet?" 
    "There."
    Chaka pulled out fine-ground dark-roasted coffee, a flask of milk, mugs, and an espresso-and-steamer device, which he plugged in. He measured water and coffee and set the thing running. Edgar Sikes wasn't in the kaffeeklatsch, any more than Ruth Moskowitz was, but both had tasted coffee. Ancient tradition spoke that a nerd must have caffeine. Aaron might sometimes follow an ancient tradition, if it amused him.
    And Trish was rubbing Edgar's neck and shoulders, flirting, maybe, but doing a damn good massage too, Chaka had felt her magic touch. She stepped back as Edgar stretched, yoga fashion.
    "Looks good," she said.
    Chaka asked, "Didn't you used to have a bad back?" 
    "Broken. It's healed pretty well. Toshiro's taught me some yoga." Edgar sat down and summoned up a hologram, an abstraction, it seemed . . . no, it was a hurricane in infrared, as seen from Geographic. They'd beamed it to the National Geographic Society on Earth, a complete recording of another world's major storm. "This was from last year. I'm going to jazz it up a little. Chaka, I'm ready for that magic fluid any time."
    The coffee was beginning to flow. Chaka filled the cups with milk. He was thinking, Toshiro's a good man. He's teaching me karate-But Chaka shouldn't say that even to Edgar, and if he said it in front of Trish, Trish would tell Aaron.
    Many things involving Aaron went unsaid. Nobody on the planet is stronger than Aaron, except Little Chaka Mubutu. So when we go to the mainland, I carry the cook pot. If a grendel came among us, the last man to use a weapon would be Little Chaka. Someone would have to protect me . . . someone like Aaron Tragon. Little Chaka doesn't compete. 
    Little Chaka doesn't know how to fight.
    The steam jet howled like a fighter jet. Trish jumped: her back was suddenly plated like an armadillo, and she turned with her eyes bugged. Chaka loved doing that . . . but Edgar never even twitched. When Chaka had the chance to look up, Edgar was moving a whirlpool of cloud over a map of Avalon.
    "We want it where people can't see it," he said. "Or can't see it ain't there. So. But the fringe, here, that'll raise hell around Robor. This arm we'll taper off a little . . . there . . . matches what Cassandra's predicting. Now here's how it looks from Surf's Up."
    Surf's Up was being torn to pieces. Anything lighter than a blockhouse was already gone, fragments floating in the huge waves, or flying through the air.
    "Like it? Here's the view from Cadmann's Folly . . . Nope, they'll see it isn't there. Okay, watch this." He had the whirlpool, the view from orbit. It bent east a bit, and shrank. Back to Cadmann's Folly-"And that matches the Cassandra prediction, which she based on my data. Aaron's too antsy, Chaka. This is the easy part." 
    "Damn," Trish said. "You're really good." 
    Edgar preened. He was, and everyone knew it, but he had something else going here.
    Trish likely hadn't found Edgar Sikes impressive. Chaka knew her style, and it was domination. But here and now, Edgar Sikes was no schmuck, no mere decoration for a woman. This was Aaron Tragon's wizard, and a wizard makes a risky servant.
    "Hey. Chaka? Do you know about a crab that lives in the tops of horsemanes?" 
    "Sure." 
    "I wondered why the grendels didn't eat them all." 
    "Grendels never did climb the big horsemanes. They knocked down smaller ones and ate them. Anything that lived in the top of a big one of those might survive. These do. Dad's studied them. They breed by getting the attention of the pterodons, who see a wiggle of prey in the top of a horsemane, and dive, and get eggs on their feet." 
    Edgar's fingers were still molding the shape of a hurricane. "What brought it to mind was my back. When Aaron and I climbed that tree. Raced for it. I was winning. I got just in reach of the top, and something with teeth flashed right at my eyes. I dropped right past Aaron." 
    He watched the hurricane raging at the hangars. Nodded to himself. He said, "I was a long time healing. Cassandra was still relearning the old medical techniques she lost to Greg's fire. Trish, Chaka, this should do it, and it's set to go. I should be on duty throughout."
    "Then we'd better get on the stick," Chaka said. "Here." He'd made Edgar a second cappuccino. Trish set it down for him, and kissed him. Chaka watched that for a bit, then stepped outside.