Reamer's heart settled back down in his chest when he saw his children working the crowd as usual, sizing up prospects for the Ogonquonian Ornaments with the same expertise they used to determine who could be tempted by the rocks and minerals in their own booth.

 

"Come on, Deeter, Turi, we have to pack up and get out."

 

"But, Daddy, -we've paid in advance for our space for the season," Turi, his little business manager, objected.

 

"Baby, haven't I told you there's things more important in life than money? Now hop to it!"

 

He was thinking fast about where they would go from here. The authorities were only nominally clean, even in these reform days. Kisia Manjari's guardian, the count, was a man of vast influence and many of the security patrolmen were in his pocket. They were far more apt to frame Reamer on some charge and detain him at Kisia s convenience than they were to be helpful. It was all fine when the Lady and her uncles and Delszaki Li had lived here but without their physical presence . . .

 

Reamer suddenly remembered the little story Becker had told of going to the pleasure house and running into Khetala. Reamer had had a similar encounter with her himself, for similar reasons. But she was one of the Lady's people, one of the children Acorna had saved from the mines. Khetala would know what to do about the horn. She could help him and the kids escape Kezdet, too. She would help them. She had to.

 

The eyes of every person in the pavilion were focused on the opening. The flap spread wide. Dancing stopped although the band played on. Then, abruptly, the band stopped, too, and Liriili, horn uncovered, strode through the crowd gathered outside, then the crowd inside, and stepped up onto the bandstand, where she appropriated the tiny amplifier. "I am calling an emergency council session in the fli-zaar's pavilion immediately. Meanwhile, all prep crews of all space vessels are to report to their ships and prepare for takeoff, and all other crew members are on standby. Commanders of the ships and all emissaries, envoys, and ambassadors will please attend the council meeting now."

 

Then she strode off, a great number of the white-skinned Linyaari following her, or leaving the party behind her.

 

Grandam, apparently undeterred by affairs of state from reminding people of their social graces, led Acorna down from the heights of the grazing platforms and she herself went to the bandstand and picked up the amplifier. "My children, those of you whose presence is not required elsewhere, please remain and dance with your loved ones as long as you may. There is still much good food on the platforms and many of you have not yet met Khornya."

 

Acorna protested. "This seems to be an emergency. Whether people meet me or not is hardly important right now.

 

But from several directions she could hear low mutterings to the effect of, "She seems to have brought trouble with her."

 

"Good manners are always important, " Grandam told her crisply. "Besides, you'll give people something to take their minds off of more worrisome matters. I must attend the council meeting, child," Grandam told her. "Young Maati can show you the way to my quarters when you're ready."

 

"I want to come, too," Acorna said. "If something has happened to the Balakiire, to Neeva and the others, I want to know."

 

"I doubt you'll be permitted to attend, child. But if the emergency concerns the Balakiire, be sure that I will let you know when I return, and also, I will see to it that you are given a berth on one of the outgoing ships. If you'll excuse me?" Acorna had no choice but to agree.

 

The revels had been most effectively stopped by Liriili's announcement but still everyone stood around waiting for further developments. At last Liriili and the council members, including Grandam, returned to the reception and the viizaar addressed the grim-faced, ridiculously dressed crowd.

 

"My people, I'm sorry if I have caused you undue alarm. The council, however, agrees that although there is no major emergency that we are aware of, nothing really to become overly concerned about, prompt action may forestall future emergencies. The Balakiire ~" Acorna held her breath.

 

"The Baiakiire, which was just dispatched to investigate a disturbing report from one of our trade missions, sent us a message that they were unable to receive transmissions from either the trade mission in question or any of our other ships or missions abroad in space or on other worlds. It is the belief of the communications officer that some sort of universal equipment failure is responsible for this silence. For that reason, in order to reestablish communication as soon as possible as well as to ensure the safety of our people in space and on other worlds and, if they are in any danger, to evacuate them as soon as possible, we are deploying the remainder of our fleet to simultaneously travel to all of the known destinations of our other ships. They will in all likelihood simply assist with the repairs of our transmitters, but if their assistance is needed in other ways, they will be there to provide it. For this reason, for all of our space fleet personnel, shore leave is cancelled and you should report to your duty stations by mid-sun tomorrow."

 

Acorna and Thariinye both rushed forward to volunteer to go back into space but the viizaar only smiled at Thariinye and said, "You're needed here." Then, ignoring Acorna, Liriili turned to go. Acorna, with two quick steps, placed herself in front of the viizaar. "If my aunt is in danger, I want to help. I need to be on one of those ships."

 

Liriili regarded her very coolly. Acorna saw that the viizaar once more had her horn-hat firmly in place and besides, the vuzaar seemed to be even more adept than most at concealing her thoughts. "If it becomes necessary for our ships to evacuate our people from space or other planets, excess personnel may cost lives. I cannot possibly take the responsibility for that risk simply to allow you to indulge your curiosity, Khornya. I hope as you spend more time among us, that you'll become less selfcentered and willful. Perhaps among the barbarians, your Linyaari intelligence made you best qualified to make decisions and lead expeditions, but here you are a mere child among those older and wiser than yourself. Your aunt left you among us to learn our ways, so I suggest you apply yourself to that goal and leave the crisis to those of us trained to deal with it."

 

Fortunately, at that moment Grandam rejoined Acorna, hearing only Liriili's last stinging words.

 

"Come along, Khornya. I tried to convince the council that you should be sent out on one of the ships being dispatched, but I was overruled. Certain know-it-all youngsters agreed with Liriili that you hadn't had a chance to evolve enough to be useful on a mission yet. Humph. Well, we older ones are considered by some of our so-called respectful descendants to be relics of a less-evolved time, you know." Her expression was wry. "That's why I thought perhaps as long as you are stuck here, you might be more comfortable staying with me. We less evolved types should stick together, don't you think?"

 

Acorna gratefully agreed.

 

"At least we know, since word of the malfunction or whatever it is that is occurring that's keeping our people from being able to contact us-came from the Baiakiire, that Neeva and the crew are safe. As a precaution, the ships going up now are having their com units equipped with special filters and boosters as well as the repair equipment for existing transmitters. New communications programs are being installed tonight as -well by the prep crews, with extras being sent along for the ships already abroad and of course, the main receivers, transmitters, and computers are being checked for some sort of fault in their space relay systems as well."

 

"What do you suppose could be causing the problem?" Acorna asked.

 

"I don't know. Perhaps a meteor storm between us and the closest transmitters in the relay system? Maybe some kind of mechanical difficulty in the transmitters themselves or even a programming flaw? A sun going nova? Liriili is right about one thing-I'm sure the problem, whatever it is, is one our crews are well equipped to sort out by themselves."

 

"You don't sound as if anyone believes there really would be a need to evacuate our people elsewhere, more as if the silence is a technical problem. In which case, why'not just send out crews to the most likely areas of interference? If there is a larger problem, all of your-our-ships could be cut off from communication with the planet, maybe even each other, and we would have no idea what was occurring. Wouldn't it be wiser to risk fewer personnel?"

 

The animation left Grandam's face and her mouth settled into a grim line. "We are hoping that this is a technical problem. If so, the council's reasoning is that the more ships we deploy to the most places, the sooner the problem will be mended. The communications channels are a lifeline to our ships, and through them to our allies, as well as a lifeline for us. It would be impossible to devote too many resources to their preservation. And in case there is a more ominous threat"-Acorna heard with her mind rather than her ears that the council was most deeply afraid of a new, heretofore unheralded attack by the Khieevi "we need to cover all options as quickly as possible so we can learn of the danger, assist if possible those affected by the threat, evacuate those it does not yet affect, and have our ships return home." She paused and said, "We would not need them for evacuation from narhii-Vhiliinyar. We do not, at this time, have an alternative home ready so evacuating this planet is not an option."

 

"But-if nothing else, people could go to Kezdet, Maganos moon, Rushima. All of the human worlds are compatible with our species."

 

Grandam took a deep breath, let it out, and said, "Of course. There are other worlds as well. But until we know there is a threat and if so, where it comes from, we would hardly know where to run, would we? The personnel in space could well be safer than those of us here on narhii-Vhiliinyar. One option seems about as good as another. If this place is not safe, Khornya, is any place?"

 

She shuddered and Acorna realized that the elder was not only deeply worried but also deeply frightened. Since there seemed to be little either of them could do about the situation, Acorna deliberately changed her focus.

 

This was not hard to do once they arrived at the Grandam's pavilion. It shimmered with a ribbon of silver streaming around teal green under the light of the two moons, one blue and one golden, and although there was nothing about it that seemed lamiharly cozy it nonetheless exuded a charming warmth and hominess.

 

Grandam Naadiina waved her hand and soft light emerged from beautifully patterned glass pillars that upheld the center and corners of her pavilion. The flaps farthest from them were open so that once more the moons were visible, and all the stars. Naadiina beckoned Acorna to follow her toward the flap, where three soft beds were arranged. On one of these lay Maati, sound asleep.

 

"I like to sleep with my face to the stars, and my memories of my lifemate on the old world," Grandam said, peeling off her gown and sliding beneath the top blanket of the bed. Acorna did the same, grateful to be rid of the makeshift finery.

 

"Maati lives here, too?" Acorna asked.

 

"Yes," Grandam said. "I think her parents felt that I could use the assistance and would be grateful for a strong young person to run my errands. Since it has become clear that they were not coming back, and Maati was orphaned, she has remained with me. She hardly remembers them and is useful as a page for Liriili and other government officials."

 

"I'm so sorry," Acorna said. "What became other parents?"

 

"They could not adjust to the loss of their two sons, Aan and Laarye. They tried to-they were here almost two ghaanyi and had time to conceive and give birth to Maati. But her mother went into a deep sadness and at last the two of them announced that the only way to solve this sadness was for them to return to the old home and try to learn what had become of their sons. They have not been heard of since. This may be a good thing. The Khieevi have not sought to entertain us with films of either them or their sons being tortured to death, so perhaps they met with a diversion along the way or perhaps their boys were rescued in some other way and they are pursuing them still."

 

"But-I thought everyone escaped when you left the old world. Neeva gave me that impression anyway. You mean you left children behind?"

 

"What could we do? The need to evacuate happened quite suddenly. And they were young men, not children. We had learned of the Khieevi before, of course, and we had already located this planet as our refuge and had our plan in readiness. But not everyone could be gathered in time for the evacuation. A few-very few, I'm happy to say-were left behind to save the majority. Maati's parents could not accept that their sons could not be found. They would have stayed behind to search but we could not allow that, much as we hated to leave anything behind for those monsters. It was agony to leave at all. I myself could scarcely bear to leave the grave of my lifemate on the same planet with the Khieevi."

 

"Will you tell me about your lifemate, and what it was like on the old world?" Acorna asked.

 

"Oh, yes. But aren't you tired after your journey and the so-called reception?" Acorna did not have to be very psychic to feel the scorn in the old lady's tone.

 

"Not really," she replied. "But I was overwhelmed. I don't think vlizaar likes me."

 

"The vilzaar was already prejudiced against you long before you arrived, my dear," she replied. "Your mother was chosen by the lifemate Liriili had already decided was her own. Unfortunately, Vaanye didn't agree."

 

"Oh, that must be it then. Neeva mentioned some bad feeling toward my family. But it doesn't seem sensible to take it out on me."

 

"Prejudice and jealousy are seldom sensible. Liriili's is not a flexible or forgiving nature."

 

"I thought that people who could read minds would be incapable of that kind ofpettiness."

 

The old lady grunted. "Except when they are healing, and really concentrating on extending empathy, or dealing with some crisis among their nearest and dearest, most people have psychic communication down to a very superficial art. One's thoughts and feelings have many layers, contradictory layers at that. And even in thought, some people are more reserved than others-or repressed, perhaps. Liriili is used to filling her mind with the details of administration and can use those to mask her feelings even from herself, as no doubt she is doing in your case.

 

"Oh. Speaking of feelings, is it true that it's already decided that Thariinye and I will be lifemates?"

 

Grandam hooted and in the dark her eyes twinkled like the stars as she rolled on her side and grinned at Acorna, only baring her teeth just a little. "Who told you that? Thariinye? I can see that he did! Of course no one has decided such a thing! Except maybe him! You've nothing to worry about there." "I'm glad," Acorna said. "I want it to feel-right." "You're a very clever girl. Are you very sleepy?" "No, not really. I feel rather restless, to tell you the truth." "That makes two of us. Would you indulge an old lady and tell me of your life? Neeva indicated in her reports that you had had some adventures. I should very much like to hear of them. Since coming here, our people have been a rather dull lot, and I do like a good story."

 

"Very well," Acorna said, and began with her earliest memories of her uncles and the mining ship.

 

She had not quite finished when both of them fell asleep. The next morning, Acorna awoke to the sound of birds singing and a stream burbling very nearby. She sat up.

 

The stream was running right behind her head, as a matter of fact, down one glass column, across the floor of the pavilion, where it was joined by the waterfall flowing down the glass column on the opposite side of the floor. Acorna cupped her hand to dip out a drink, and found that the water was actually covered by glass. So were the singing birds that flew from another column, across the top of the pavilion, to disappear into the column opposite the one where the flight had begun. Within the bird's path, clouds drifted with seeming air currents and, at the base of the pillars, the branches of bushes seemed to bob in a breeze.

 

Acorna yawned and stretched. The pallet beside hers was empty. Then she noticed that beyond the bird column, the flap was closed and voices were coming from the other side.

 

She rose and pulled on the undergown from the previous night, wishing she still had her flight suit instead.

 

The front flap opened, and Grandam Naadiina entered the pavilion. Her arms were full of various items, bouquets of wild flowers, notes, and sheaves of edible grasses and big leafed vegetables.

 

"Here, let me help you," Acorna said, rushing forward to relieve her hostess of some of the burden.

 

"You may as well take them all. Young males haven't left such tributes to me in a long time."

 

"You mean these are for me? But-why?"

 

"Your welcome home reception was interrupted and your guests did not get properly introduced. I suppose these are by way of being an apology, if not an invitation, on behalf of some of your guests. Perhaps some of them were fellows who are going off planet now and will have no chance to meet you until they return." She paused. "Besides, the Ancestors seem to approve of you, whether or not Liriili does. The opinions of the Ancestors carry a great deal of weight with our people."

 

Acorna shook her head, disbelieving, as she deposited some of the edibles-the wildflowers were edible, too-on one of the low tables near the eastern wall of the pavilion. There was no kitchen facility, or rest room either. Like Acorna, the Linyaari of course tended to graze, eating only fresh vegetables and grasses, so a food preparation area was unnecessary. They buried their waste in the ground, too-or in an area of the hydroponics gardens, as Acorna and her shipmates had done aboard ship. There was no taboo about this. Linyaari recycled food with a clean efficiency that made the waste excellent fertilizer, Neeva had told her. Acorna's human upbringing made her wonder at the lack of squeamishness about this function, but then, humans often used recycled urine for water while on long voyages, too, and the connection was at least one step more remote in this case.

 

"I'm glad they approve," Acorna said. "It was rather difficult to tell."

 

"It always is, for anyone other than an attendant. Your brow is wrinkled. Why is that? What's bothering you?"

 

"Just that I made a fool of myself last night, and then there was the emergency and here I am being given gifts, when everyone is so very worried. I don't want people to give me things because they feel guilty or intimidated. I want to make friends, to learn to know and understand our people."

 

"You are a very sensitive girl and your attitude does you proud. However, many of the people last night, including our leader, were most ungracious to you and the gifts show that they realize that. The emergency no doubt kept some of them from making complete asses out of themselves. These gifts are actually quite a healthy sign-that in spite of the crisis, some of them cared enough about your feelings to apologize. Once this would not have been at all unusual but our people have changed, since the evacuation." Her voice drifted off, sadly. When she spoke again, it was to change the subject. "Now then. Tell me more about your adventures."

 

Acorna was surprised. She was not used to talking as much as she had talked the night before. It was easy to talk to Grandam though. The funny thing was, sometimes Acorna knew that Grandam didn't merely hear her words-that she saw Acorna's own memories as well, felt what Acorna was feeling as she remembered, felt as she had felt while experiencing the events the memories recorded. But with Grandam Naadiina, Acorna didn't worry about what was thought-talk and what was verbal. She knew without needing to question that Grandam understood what she was trying to communicate, however she communicated it. And that, Grandam's willingness and ability to really know her, was what had drawn her out. It had been that way somewhat with Neeva and the others, but there had always been their own thoughts, their considerations of what was and was not Linyaari, that got in the way.

 

Grandam smiled at Acorna in the brief pause the girl took before speaking and nodded. "I see that you have shared enough with me already. It has been my pleasure hearing your tales. They are so different from anything else one hears on this planet, among our people. Never fear, granddaughter, that you are unworthy. Our people don't yet know you or understand you but they will."

 

Acorna took a deep breath and straightened her spine. "Not if I don't make the attempt to get to know them, Grandam. Apparently I cannot help out with the crisis in space, but perhaps I can at least offer comfort to those left behind here on the planet. The gifts have given me an opening. First, I must try to learn who sent each bundle and thank them, and visit with them, and not bare my teeth." Her mouth curled in a smile but she determinedly kept her lips closed. "I must also speak with the people who designed the dresses they so kindly sent-and pay for the two I altered to suit myself."

 

"That is not necessary, you know. It's all been put on Neeva's account at her instruction."

 

"Nevertheless, I fear I insulted them and after I saw how everyone was dressed last night, I better understood the intent of the designers. I would like to tell them so."

 

"That would be most gracious, my dear. They are very silly though, these fashions."

 

Acorna could not truthfully debate that point, but continued. "Be that as it may, I was told that there was a possibility that some day I would return to Kezdet and Maganos and my human friends as an ambassador of the Linyaari. I don't seem to be making a good start of it yet. So perhaps, since I don't yet know exactly what it is to be a Linyaari, I should begin to explore that and in the process, practice ambassadorship by trying to represent the culture from which I've come in a more positive manner than I seem to have done so far."

 

"Bravo!" said Grandam Naadiina. "You have a splendid attitude with which to begin your work, I must say. And perhaps with your broad experience of other worlds, you will be able to ease some of the fears people have for their loved ones in space."

 

Acorna's mind was already so busy planning her day she simply nodded to acknowledge Grandam's approval. "And also, I would like to meet some of these techno-artisans Maati was telling me about, the ones who design, alter, and adapt the technological trade items to Linyaari tastes."

 

"They have their own community, actually, but it's not too far from here to walk, though the path is a bit overgrazed. And you must realize that many of them spend considerable time on other host planets, learning the basics and keeping up with the new developments. A few of them will be on the crews shipping out but by no means all."

 

"So they spend a lot of time in space?" Acorna asked. "That's very interesting. No one in any place I have ever been has ever seen a being like me before the Balaklire came looking for me."

 

"Is that so? In some parts of the universe we're quite a routine sight, you know. But those are peaceful parts, and if they cease to be peaceful, we cease to be seen there." Her tone had a wry twist to it that made Acorna realize with some surprise that the words had been thought and not spoken, for she saw an image of Linyaari techno-artisans in training hastily vacating a planet where hostilities were erupting.

 

"Is this all right to wear to go calling?" Acorna asked, indicating the gown she had worn the night before.

 

"My dear, it wouldn't bother a soul if you went out unclothed altogether. We aren't fussy about those things around here, not for modesty's sake, anyway. But the weather does turn suddenly. Allow me to loan you something. You'll be pleased to know extreme fashion is only utilized in formal clothing. For daytime wear we are rather more practical."

 

Grandam raised the lid of one of the low tables, and inside were folded a variety of garments. From among these, she selected a simple knee-length tunic with long full sleeves and a neckline cut low in back to accommodate the hair that grew down Acorna s spine and that of every other Linyaari. Acorna slipped it over her head.

 

"Very comfortable," she said.

 

"Yes, but it does need a touch. It's a bit too floppy on you. Here, this will do nicely." Grandam handed her the most gorgeous belt Acorna had ever seen. The edges were intricately braided and interwoven of some strong but supple material, while the body of the belt was patterned with faceted gemstone beads woven into the design of birds and water, flowers and distant mountains with a stream flowing the length of the belt. Acorna had to stroke and admire it a moment before buckling it around her waist. The buckle continued the pattern of the belt in a slightly wider motif of a very tall mountain with one sun setting and another rising on the other side of it.

 

Grandam smiled. "It suits you. Niciuye made it for me to wear for our ceremony of union when we were still courting. Unfortunately, it lacks a few Diich'<fe' of meeting around my waist these days. The scenes, as you may have guessed, are from our original home world. It was the only home Niciirye knew."

 

"What became of him?" Acorna asked. "If it isn't too painful for you to tell me?"

 

"Not at all. He was even older than I and died peacefully in his sleep. He was well enough, and an excellent healer, but his parts were simply worn out. I begin to understand that problem myself. I do miss him though-his foolishness as much as his guidance. Ah well. I hope you can find someone you care for and who cares for you as much."

 

Acorna sighed. "Right now I'll settle for not making an outcast of myself."

 

"I'm sure when people get to know you, they'll be sincerely glad you've come. I think you will have much better luck talking to one or two people at a time. You are not a shallow person, and small talk is essentially a shallow form of communication. It will not be necessary when you are alone with other individuals. Just be yourself and be willing to take each person as you find him or her and you'll do well."

 

"I'm sure you're right," Acorna said. "Now, how do I find these places?"

 

"I'll send for Maati." Grandam poked her head out of the tent, ready to call.

 

"Oh, no, surely with the crisis, the vilzaar will need her more than ever today. Really, if you'll just tell me, I'll find my own way. I don't want Liriili to have another excuse to resent me."

 

It was Grandam Naadiina's turn to sigh. She moved back into the tent. "I suppose you're right. Very well then, I'll draw you a map. When you're ready to visit the techno-artisans, come back here and I'll take you myself. I've left a heating unit with Kaakiri for repair and it should be ready by now."

 

 

 

Hafiz Harakamian regarded his second wife, his most lusciously beautiful bride, with alarm bordering on panic. "Karina, my little pomegranate, you grow thin and pale!"

 

Indeed, half of her second chin had disappeared, and the lovely little roll of belly below her amethyst-encrusted lavender bra and bolero and above the amethyst-studded band of the diaphanous lilac harem pants she wore was eclipsed from its usual full moon to little more than a quarter.

 

"Tell me, oh my garden of delights, why do you wither away to nothing? Is there some wish I have not fulfilled? Some food you crave I have not had fetched from the corners of the universe to delight your delicate palate? Some garment you would desire to swathe your so lovely figure"-and he almost drooled as he said it, for his new bride was all that he had hoped she would be "that I have not had made for you from the finest materials by the most talented and skillful seamstresses available? Some redecorating, maybe, you'd like to do to our homes?" he asked in desperation, as the first two questions were meeting with no response but a slight trembling of her lower lip and flutter other eyelashes.

 

"Oh, Haffy, my darling figgy pudding hubby," Karina said, for she was not to be outdone in hyperbolic compliments to her wealthy husband who, if he was not exactly handsome, still had a wonderfully compelling personality, tremendous vitality, enormous charisma, quite startling capabilities in the bedroom, and marvelous taste in women-not to mention oodles and oodles of lovely money, "you have done everything to satisfy my body but my spirit remains unfulfilled."

 

"Why is that, o beloved whose face is like unto a blossoming white rose, whose eyes are brighter than the twinkling stars, whose ..."

 

She cut off the flow by burying her face in her heavily beringed hands. "I fear I allowed myself to be distracted from my own spiritual journey by the suddenness of our passion. So overcome was I with the newness of our love that I grew complacent about what I knew was my true calling, my greatest spiritual quest-to aid Acorna and her people and teach them to channel their energies and use their gifts in a proper"-and profitable, for Karina thought wealth was very proper-"manner."

 

"But, my little oasis of carnal conviviality, Acorna went with her people to learn their ways and will soon return to us. Surely you need not pine?"

 

She sighed deeply. They were sitting beside the fountain in the courtyard, where they had just partaken of a fabulous meal. She had only picked at the third course and had barely touched her sherbet. She popped another of those little chocolate egg truffles into her mouth though. Haflz was right. She had to keep her strength up. "Oh, Hafiz, my wise and wily warrior in the world of wealth, you are such a debonair fellow, so learned in the ways of commerce and the battle of the marketplace, that in your munificence of spirit you no doubt saw the beautiful Linyaari beings as like yourself, as sophisticated as they were soignee.

 

"But I, who communed with them on both a deeper level and a higher plane than any among our own kind, recall their childlike innocence, their need to be nurtured and tutored along the great spiritual pathway that it has been my privilege to travel lo these many years. Their incredible healing and purifying powers which really need sharp management so they don't go exhausting themselves by giving all that valuable stuff away.

 

"I was to have been Acorna's mentor in just such a way, but now our lovely Lady of the Light has gone with them to this secluded home world of theirs, a place where no one can find them, a place where our beloved Acorna and all other potential are lost-not to mention the potential of a whole planetful just like her! -to me and all who love her."

 

Hafiz scratched his bearded chin, pondering the words of his wife, words which he had come to learn had many levels of wisdom.

 

Then he shrugged as if it were all a small matter. "Acorna said she would return, and her people were of the opinion that she would be given honors and rank among them and sent to us as an envoy. I'm sure she and they will be with us again soon, O my heart of butter. And this home where they live is only in space, beloved, not in that land where our esteemed friend and colleague Li now resides. And if these people can locate it in space, so can the finest engineers and navigators in my employ-that is to say, the finest engineers and navigators available. And this planet, if need be, could be visited. Especially by a friend."

 

"Friend? Why, you are practically the only family she has! Apart from your nephew and his friends, she had only Mr. Li. And while I am in constant contact with him, his guidance is lost to her. In fact," she added shrewdly, "it is his guidance in this matter, his insistence that Acorna and her people should still have access to our advice and assistance, that has caused me to dwell on this matter while neglecting my diet."

 

Hafiz was momentarily incensed. "You have been having clandestine visits with Delszaki Li, my old rival, and neglecting to feed the body upon which I have lavished so much love?"

 

"He is dead, Haffy," she said reasonably.

 

"But you entertain his counsel!"

 

"My darling, it is my calling to succor such spirits, to keep open the channels of communication between the planes. I cannot reject the spirits any more than you can reject a profit!"

 

"But Li himself organized her departure, outfitted her ship ..."

 

"Yes, but he says he always intended that one or more other guardians should go with her. Had she not left prematurely, I would have intercepted her and been aboard the vessel that carried her away the first time. Of course, it didn't occur to her aunt to invite me along. What with us being newlyweds and all." She blushed, a blush that cast a roseate dawn upon the exposed globes above her overflowing bodice.

 

Hafiz, never one to be outdone at the bargaining table, even of love, reached for her. "Perhaps I am at this moment too distracted with concern for your health to consider these matters, my little couscous. Come, I cannot speak of this further until I have once more personally inspected the possible damage your dietary deprivation has wreaked upon your beauteous body."

 

Karina, who was not yet over the novelty of having a man so besotted with her that, while he insisted she wear her flowing robes in public, it was only so that she could wear, if anything, skimpy little outfits like this one for him and him alone to drool over in private. His hands were very skillful and the look in his eyes made her feel, as always, quite faint with desire. Besides, he was always more reasonable afterward. As for Hafiz, he was even more aroused than usual, recalling the words of his voluptuous vixen, the ones where she pointed out that there was a profit to be made in the talents of Acorna and her kind. His Karina was not only lusciously lovely but also had a head for business-a true helpmeet at last!

 

Before he had time to explore this side of her along with the others, a discreet cough from behind him made him turn toward the lacey latticework of the door leading into the garden. "Your pardon. Lord and Master and gracious lady, but a matter of great urgency has arisen that requires your presence, Master, something you and you alone must attend to."

 

"And so I will when it pleases me," Hafiz said with a glower at the servant, who had been in his employ since boyhood and certainly knew better than to interrupt him when he was engaged in the pursuit of marital bliss. "It should be obvious to you that it does not please me now."

 

"Yes, Great Lord. But I swear to you upon the Three Books and by the Three Prophets that though you reward my impertinence with a thousand lashes for this interruption, you would redouble that punishment if I neglected my duty in informing you of this matter."

 

"This is so?" Hafiz asked. He had not risen to his present position by ignoring urgent business when it was brought to his attention, even when it was so wretchedly inconvenient as it was now.

 

"Even so, Great Lord and Master," the servant said with a bow.

 

"Ah, very well then." He kissed Karina tenderly on the cheek for he dared not kiss her lips or he would never leave, gave her belly a longing stroke, shoved the gold enameled dish wrought with nightingales and piled with chocolate truffle eggs into her hands and said, "Eat, my dainty doe of deliciousness. You will need all of your strength when I return."

 

"As will you, my love," she said in a sultry voice that all but drove him mad.

 

Didi Yasmin, currently unemployed since the combined forces of Delszaki Li and the peculiar horned girl had put all of the pleasure houses of Kezdet out of business, was still in mourning. This fact distressed her, as black was not one other better colors. But a son was a son and hers was dead and her husband and supposed widower no doubt had something to do with it. Therefore, he should pay. Would pay.

 

He would never miss it, she thought, looking around at the thick red-patterned carpets, the crimson and emerald silk-covered cushions of the divan, the endless cabinets of lustrous and exotic woods filled with equally lustrous and exotic treasures, the masses of fresh blooms plucked from his gardens, which were cooled by no fewer than a thousand flowing fountains.

 

And he owed her. She had given him the son and heir he demanded of a wife and he had wasted the boy and given away his empire to that asteroid-hopping nephew of his. But the worst of all was that he had had the gall to remarry without even bothering to make absolutely certain she, his real wife, was dead.

 

True, she had gone to elaborate lengths to fake her death so that she might return to her own profitable career in the sex industry, but it had always galled her how easily and with what apparent relief he accepted the exaggerated reports of her demise. He had been glad, back then, to have the boy to himself. She had been glad to leave her son as well, then. She had found motherhood extremely taxing, despite a whole platoon of nannies, and even then had hated to have anyone thinking she was old enough to be someone's mother!

 

But it had suited her purposes and those of her employers that she keep track of both her husband and her son. Her son had frequented the houses other colleagues and even, on a couple of occasions, had graced her own establishment, though of course he didn't recognize her.

 

A fine boy, a strapping boy. Too bad he had caused such damage to the women he had used that they had to be replaced, at great expense, of course. After that, she reluctantly banned him. As for her dear husband, she was kept well informed of his movements and interests through those enemies she had happily supplied with detailed maps of his compound, an inventory of his most treasured possessions, the names of all of his personal guards she could recall, and other readily marketed information.

 

It was these people who finally secured her release from prison and these people, also, who engineered her arrival at this same compound where once she had been mistress, who got her past the guards, and who supplied her with one other little thing.

 

Hafiz delighted her by gaping at her as if she were indeed the ghost he supposed her to be.

 

"Yasmin!" he gasped, as his well-fed and gorgeously robed form appeared from among the glittering beads of the curtained doorway.

 

"Greetings, husband," she said sweetly. "I was told you have recently remarried. I am assuming from this that you have recently embraced at least Reform Neo-Hadathian customs and have become polygamous, since we two are still legally twined in wedded bliss." His face was turning the exact shade of scarlet she had hoped to see. She smiled sweetly. "No, no, my darling husband, do not imagine that I object. A senior wife can always use a young one to relieve her of some of her more distasteful duties. But I am surprised she is not here to greet me as well. Is this new girl perhaps indisposed? I had so hoped to meet her and see if she can live up to my standards'-and of course, to instruct her in her duties to me, as your first wife and khaSliu."

 

Hafiz stared at Yasmin, with whom he had once briefly been so infatuated and whom he had long believed to be dead. He had never mourned her properly, it was true, for despite her beauty as a young woman, and her apparent ardor, she had not been a very good wife. She was vicious, vain, and somewhat stupid, so much so in fact that like many petty criminals her own emotional shortcomings even got in the way of fulfilling her greed at times. And Yasmin had been a very greedy woman.

 

Unfortunately, it seemed she was also alive, because she did appear to be breathing even though she very much looked the part of a ghost. Her once-charming face had been resculpted, had had its wrinkles repeatedly removed by poison and knife blade so often that her skin looked as if it had been stretched over her skull bones like the skin of a goat on a drum. It was shiny, not from youthful moistness and freshness, but rather, it appeared, from some sort of pickling process that made it look thick and coarse. Little veins had broken in her cheeks.

 

Her mouth was puffy with the injections she used to keep it from falling back into its former thinness-but back then, though thin, that mouth had been ready for bawdy laughter, and that was part of what had attracted him to her. Now it looked as if it pained her to speak. Her eyes had had the lids lifted and brows tattooed above them.

 

Thick eyelashes had been implanted to augment her own. But none of this disguised the dull, stony glare of her eyes. Beneath black veils trimmed in a tasteless manner in black spangles, her hair was stiff with gilt metallic dye.

 

"Yasmin, you are dead by law if not in fact, and even if you remain my wife, it is only in name, and that will not be for much longer, now that I know it is a problem. Had I realized that you still lived, I would not have divorced you before, for the sake of our son, but now that he is gone "

 

"Murdered," Yasmin whispered, her eyes narrowed to slits. "Foully murdered and yet I understand that you, his father, did nothing to avenge him! Have in fact, it is said, with unseemly haste replaced him with that asteroid-hopping nephew of yours as your heir."

 

"Tapha had it coming. He was our son, it is true, but it is also true that he was a vicious and ignorant pig." "He didn't get that from my side of the family." Hafiz waved his hand in dismissal. "No matter. There is no longer any your side of the family. Your side of the family, apparently through your own contrivance, is extinct. And you have not been a member of my family in many years. It grieves me to tell you, oh dear departed mother of our late unlamented son, that I would have disinherited Tapha even if he lived. The boy managed, despite his legitimate birth during our marriage, to be a bastard of the worst kind."

 

"You have no sense of family! It is a good thing that I have returned, as your khaSine, to instruct my junior wife."

 

Hafiz looked as if he were about to explode, and said in a slow, dangerous voice, "You will not speak to her, you will not so much as lay eyes upon her. You are not khaSlne. You are no longer even my wife."

 

He took a deep breath and began chanting the expeditious ancient Hadathian method of ridding oneself of unwanted marital attachments, "I divorce you, I divorce you, I-"

 

Before he could say it the third and decisive time, she interrupted in a shrill, high whine that would not allow him to ignore it.

 

"You think you can cast me out, just like that, kill my son, marry another, and dismiss me as if I were someone of no consequence?"

 

"I am certainly about to," Hafiz told her.

 

"There's no need to get so unpleasant. As you recall, it was I who left you. I was only testing you," she said with a poisonously sweet smile. She pulled a beautifully jeweled box from her robes and offered it to him. "I confess, I was afraid you might react this way, that the shock of my resurrection would prove too much for you and that the years we have spent apart would have put too great a strain on your affection. Still, although I do not care for the way you've treated me, I am a broad-minded woman. And to show there are no hard feelings, I have brought you a wedding present. One I know will be of great interest to you."

 

"I have no wish for your gifts-but, ahhh-is that a rare Terran early nineteenth century inlaid vermilion and jade snuffbox similar to the one from the court of the French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte?" He must at least inspect such a treasure. His fingers itched to do so, as they did with any fine and rare collectible object. Perhaps he was only imagining the sneer that crossed Yasmin's red swollen mouth?

 

"The very one. The emperor himself gorged his very nostrils from this same box, oh avaricious husband. And now it holds a new rarity, a treasure of particular meaning for you. Go ahead, take it."

 

He started to accept it from her hand and then thought better of it. "No, you open it. Show me. It would be like you to have had it fitted with some poisoned clasp ..."

 

"You wrong me, beloved," she said, and wondered how the man who sold her this box had known that Hafiz would say this. She touched the catch and the lid popped open. "You see? Nothing in it but fine sparkling powder, like ground moonstones or opals."

 

"I do not traffic in drugs, Yasmin," Hafiz said huffily. He didn't either. Not any more. Not for many years. Well, not on a regular basis. It wasn't really profitable any more.

 

"Ah, but, husband, this is no drug of the sort to which you refer. This is a very special powder indeed. It will heal any wound, neutralize poisons, and will act as an amazing aphrodisiac to any man or woman who takes only a few grains in a drink or food."

 

"This is so?" Hafiz asked. "That is a wondrous thing indeed, mother of my deservedly-deceased son. And something I will happily accept if only you will tell me, why is it that you, who have never, so far as I could discern, borne love for any part of me but my wealth, bestow this upon me? As a gift," he reminded her hastily. A gift was, after all, a gift, though for a remedy with such powers as this powder was said to have, he might well have paid a great deal.

 

"Because, dear husband, it is said to come from the horn of a humanoid being who has but a single horn in the center other forehead. Since you once showed favor to such a being ..." She laughed, and taking a deep breath, blew the powder from the open box into his face, and into his eyes, blinding him with a starry swirl that also, somehow, silenced him and made him swoon so that when he regained his senses he was lying upon the central pattern of the Garden of Paradise carpet, and the living ghost of his late wife had vanished.

 

He was one with his home world, gray-brown and broken, and to an onlooker would have been almost indistinguishable from the rubble. He no longer knew which was rock and soil and which part of his own body, except for the pain. He had had no fear, when the ship landed, that either the small furry animal or the cumbersome monster who kept flinging things in and out of the vessel would notice him.

 

But he watched when they landed once more with far greater trepidation, and with relief that he had already removed from its resting place the sacred trust that undoubtedly drew the outsiders.

 

The House of Harakamian chemists reported ?????   that the powder -was a mixture of the ground pollens of the rare Wahanamoian Blossom of Sleep and another substance difficult to analyze, but appearing to be calcified tissue of the horn variety, about which they could say nothing further except that one of the men who had cut himself accidentally a little earlier spontaneously healed upon coming in contact with the powder.

 

Hafiz mentioned nothing of this to Karina. Until he could finalize his divorce to a supposedly dead woman, he did not wish to jeopardize his marriage by mentioning the inconvenient vitality of his late spouse to his present one.

 

But he was very troubled indeed. Surely, Yasmin had obtained the powder through her underworld contacts, which he was certain she had, as who else would have financed her all these years while she plied the trade that she seemed to feel made her a star? But if these people had somehow contrived to murder Acorna and the delegation from her home planet, Hafiz felt sure they would have said so more directly-he himself would have done that, though he was often the most indirect of men. Therefore, this powder was a warning. And yet-where could the horn material have come from?

 

A sickening thought occurred to him. Before he had met the Linyaari, they had broadcast as a warning vids of the Khieevi torturing Linyaari prisoners. Was there some faction of the sort of worm with whom Yasmin consorted so low as to actually have contacts among the Khieevi who would sell them Linyaari horn?

 

If so, this was a very grave matter. Acorna and her people should know of it at once. Hafiz wished to contact his nephew and heir about the matter but decided on balance it was best to do so in person rather than trusting the com units. Hafiz was far too practical to be overly brave, and Yasmin's ability to come and go without his knowledge had shaken him profoundly.

 

He forbade his house staff to say anything of the surprise visit to Karina until he could decide how to tell her himself and ordered the entire compound searched for the presence of his late wife. As he suspected, she had disappeared utterly and completely while he lay drugged on the floor of his own home.

 

At last, only three hours' time from when he had last been at Karina's side, Hafiz appeared in the marital bedchamber, where his bride lounged upon their connubial couch. She had been sleeping, he thought, but had awakened at his step.

 

"Karina," he said, "You have convinced me. Our ship is being prepared and we shall soon depart for the Linyaari home world to visit Acorna and the others."

 

Karina would have known at once that something was amiss even if she had not already encountered a deeply troubled and no doubt deluded woman claiming to be Hafiz's true wife. She naturally assumed that the woman was a ghost, since Hafiz's first wife was dead. Of course, she could have been one of the holograms Hafiz was always constructing to surprise a person in odd nooks and crannies, but why would he make an ugly hologram that claimed to be his wife? Had to be a ghost. Karina attempted to soothe and comfort her, to tell her to go back into the light, but the specter had merely looked annoyed. Presumably she had then gone on to haunt Hafiz, or had just come from haunting him, as the very next time Karina saw him he was behaving in a very peculiar fashion, as those who had received visitations from the other side sometimes did.

 

For one thing, Hafiz addressed Karina by name instead of calling her by one of his lengthy endearments. For another thing, he gave up without even a token tussle, totally unlike him, and let her have her way about seeking out Acorna's people. And for a third thing, he hardly ever did anything in haste, but always with slow and deliberate preparation.

 

His sudden acquiescence so alarmed Karina that she backtracked slightly.

 

"My darling, perhaps we should wait a little after all," she said, easing him down beside her with a light tug on his hand. "You look unwell. You perspire and your color is not at all good. I think you need a course of some of my special herbal teas and perhaps we should burn a cinnamon candle tonight to ease your-"

 

"Pack it, beloved!" he said. "Pack all of the tea and candles you wish. Pack your gowns and jewels, pack your cards and stones and your crystal ball. But we cannot deprive Acorna and her people of our guidance for another day."

 

Nor could they wait a moment longer, he thought privately, for Yasmin to return and spoil the honeymoon any more than she had already done. Hafiz worried his first wife's troublemaking would be even more distressing next time-and more obvious to Karina. He wouldn't allow that. Women were extremely difficult to understand, even for a man of his considerable amatory experience. But what worried him more than Yasmin's tricks was that the security of his stronghold had been breached. If he was to go, it had best be in all haste, before Yasmin's unsavory associates followed her here.

 

In the meantime he had ordered a complete restructuring of his security strategies, changes in locks, codes, and passwords, and that the compound be totally remodeled and its defenses reinforced. In his early days of affection-very well, lust-for Yasmin, he had shown her everything -everything.

 

He deeply regretted that now, for even though he had added and altered several systems since the time of his first wife, still she knew too much. He and Karma would not truly be safe here, in his own home, until the presence of Yasmin was purged.

 

His personal vessel was kept in readiness at all times and well equipped for his comfort on journeys around most of his customary haunts. He commanded that it be readied for an extended cruise and had retrieved the data plotted by Calum Baird and Acorna for their originally planned journey to the Linyaari home world.

 

They would travel with the bare minimum crew-pilot, navigator, physician, and communications officer, plus one trusted personal attendant for each of them, including the ship's officers, who must be relaxed and at peace to do their jobs well.

 

Hafiz himself was a competent pilot but for such a long journey, and one that had not actually been previously successfully completed by anyone of his acquaintance, he preferred to employ a specialist.

 

He would have preferred to take along his personal chef, the hairdresser and dressmaker, manicurist, massage therapist, valet, lady's maid, and other servants they were accustomed to, but most of these functions could either be performed by the personal attendants or were well within the ship's ability to provide electronically. For entertainment, they would have his holograms to amuse them and add a bit of spice and variety to the atmosphere. He had been constructing and collecting holograms most of his adult life, first as a business and now as one of his little hobbies. They were lightweight, took up no actual room, and could be surprisingly useful.

 

In the interests of maintaining security-both his own and that of the Linyaari, he decided that perhaps they had best rough it on this journey. His skeleton crew was handpicked and had been raised and educated within the House of Harakamian. They were loyal and trustworthy.

 

Then there was the additional problem that, in the interests of establishing rapport with Acorna's people, he felt he could not carry the usual arsenal on board, or any obvious security guards. Although the crew and attendants were well trained in security functions, that was not their primary job. Perhaps braving the unknown without sufficient weaponry or an army at his back was foolish, but there were always the ship's builtin defenses that could be deployed if necessary. He doubted even the Linyaari would suspect they were there. Given his mission, it was either go this way, or not at all.

 

In the unlikely event that Acorna's people did spot his ship's defenses, the Linyaari would simply have to understand. He was sincerely attempting to come in peace-very possibly at the expense of his people's safety, as well as his own. He could only hope their departure would be rapid enough that Yasmin and whoever it was she worked for would be unable to launch a pursuit.

 

Karina was rather distracted on the journey from Laboue to Maganos.

 

"What troubles you, my love?"

 

"My spirit guides keep looking over their ectoplasmic shoulders, darling. I'm just sure they're trying to tell me I've left something important behind or perhaps we forgot to turn off some major appliance-"

 

"You are having a flashback to your days of penury and poverty, flower of my soul. You have servants to see to those things now, remember? "

 

She gave him a wan little smile. "So we do, O beloved. Still, I wish the communication was clearer. It's very disorienting to spirit guides moving from planet to planet, you know. They get very attached to the places from whence they entered the other side."

 

"Indeed? You are a fountain of information, best beloved among women. I had no idea."

 

Oh, yes!

 

"Tell me, love of my life, is Delszaki Li still among your otherworldly friends?"

 

Uh, my, yes.

 

"Then tell him your husband said that he's to explain himself at once and stop worrying you, precious pearl of psychic perception."

 

Karina giggled. "Oh, Hafiz, you are so cute when you're indignant. I couldn't say that to Mr. Li. But I will mention that you are concerned, too, and see if he can offer enlightenment. I must meditate in solitude to concentrate my energies. Now, where is that twenty-carat amethyst crystal you gave me?"

 

"I believe you loaned it to the physician to try to communicate with his bacterial specimens, my love."

 

"So I did. Well, I'll simply have to borrow it back. I must have the proper tools of my profession, after all. Can you manage without me for a while, beloved?"

 

"Each moment will be as a dagger in my heart, sweet and succulent spouse, but I will valiantly endure."

 

They kissed and she departed.

 

To the communications officer, Hafiz said, "Please alert Maganos Base to have my nephew standing by when we arrive."

 

A moment later the Maganos communications officer said in the high and low cracking voice of a boy going through puberty, which he no doubt was since the moon was now a training facility for youngsters and the trainees provided the personnel for almost every phase of the operation, "Shahrazad, this is Maganos Base. We weren't expecting Mr. Harakamian!"

 

"We're aware of that, Maganos Base. That's why Mr. Harakamian wishes to speak to his nephew. Can you contact him please and put him on screen?"

 

"I'll try, Shahrazad. Just a tic."

 

But the face that appeared on the comscreen was not Rafik's but Calum Baird's. Hafiz placed himself in front of the communications officer so that his own face and voice would appear on Baird's screen.

 

"Ah, senior and ugliest wife of my nephew, how goes it?" Hafiz asked, delighting to see the color rise above Baird's red beard at the mention of their first meeting, when Baird, as well as Acorna, had worn veils and a long gown to promote the idea that Rafik had become one of the fundamentalist polygamist Neo-Hadathians.

 

"Not so bad, oh robber baron who makes All Baba's forty thieves look like rank amateurs," Baird responded. "But I regret to tell you that Rafik had to go to Rushima. Dr. Hoa had a spot of trouble he had to discuss with him."

 

"In that case, don't wait up for us, my friend. We will go to Rushima instead for I must speak with my nephew personally. Ah-Baird?"

 

"Yes?"

 

"How is my nephew's junior wife? Has anyone heard from her or the other members of the harem?"

 

At first Baird looked puzzled and then he said, carefully, "We last heard from them as they were leaving this quadrant, about twenty days ago. They were all well and uh-looking forward to being united with their families."

 

"I see. And Baird?"

 

"Yes?"

 

"Your last cruise with the junior wife-would your plans have brought you to the destination you wished? Did the other harem members give you a clue?"

 

"Why, yes, as a matter of fact, they did. We would have come within-uh-the anteroom of the seraglio, so to speak. Why?"

 

"Oh, no reason. Just curious. A small wager I had with my own navigator. Nothing of any importance."

 

"Right," Baird said, in a tone that clearly meant "pull the other one."

 

"Shahrazad out," Hafiz said cheerfully.

 

"Have a nice voyage," Baird replied sweetly and with an exaggeratedly effeminate wiggle of his fingers. His bushy eyebrows were twisted with concern, however, and Hafiz knew that the Caledonian understood something of the nature of the business the Shahrazal had with Rafik.

 

The Condor contained certain modifications that were not purely born of mechanical necessity. A bank of multifrequency scanners was arrayed directly in front on the control console. Next to the cargo, these scanners were the most important item contained on the ship, aside from the captain and first mate.

 

Becker was constantly keeping a weather eye and ear open for distress signals, blips where there shouldn't be blips, homing beacons, any sort of indication that some vessel, station, planetoid, or whatever might now be or have been in trouble in the recent past. Of course, Becker had a first aid kit and was perfectly willing to assist survivors if necessary, but his interest was not solely humanitarian -or alienatarian, as the case might be. He simply wanted to know where trouble had been, where vessels or settlements might be abandoned, leaving behind equipment and other good stuff for an enterprising scavenger. His scanning devices were aided by other sensors that detected the physical presence of largish items in the Condor's vicinity and, just as usefully, detected the absence of the usual detritus, an indication that one of the useful holes or folds in space might be at hand. While some of these things could be plotted, others sometimes occurred where they never had before. "Space moths," Becker Senior had postulated. "Damn space moths been chewin' in this sector again. Shall we see where this one goes, boy?"

 

It wasn't that it hadn't ever occurred to Theophilus Becker that he might guide the Condor into one of these little byways in space that made life jolly for astrophysicists and never find his way out. It was that neither he nor Jonas usually had an actual schedule or anything so he felt free to poke around. While it was certainly possible they could become lost in infinity, as the old vids were always postulating, the senior Becker held the opinion that there was a pattern and a predictability to these wrinkles in the space/time continuum within a given area. It was an opinion he hadn't shared with much of anyone but Jonas, who figured what was good enough for Dad was good enough for him and took the same cavalier attitude toward wormholes and such, new or used.

 

Normally he didn't go out of his way to pay these instruments undue attention as long as they were working. If he didn't notice, RK often did and would sit staring pointedly at one screen or another until Becker did likewise.

 

But he was a little nervous about being followed by Kisia Manjari and company and also was on the lookout to restock the inventory as soon as possible.

 

As soon as he had cleared Kezdet and her moons, he turned his attention to the scanners. He hadn't expected to be sought real soon, actually, but one of the short-range scanners was keeping up a continuous, pulsing bleep. It had to be close, but he couldn't see its source on any of the screens.

 

"Well, doggone it anyway," he said, "Where are you, little bleep?"

 

It bleeped again. Still nothing on the screen though he looked fast, as if he was expecting the visual manifestation of the sound to be playing peekaboo with him.

 

By the time the Condor had cleared Kezdet's solar system and warped through a couple of wormholes, Becker was getting pretty tired of the beep. He also noticed that RK wasn't hanging out on deck much any more. When they were back to cruising through what was usually calm empty space, Becker went below decks with a can of fish he'd picked up on Kezdet before hitting the pleasure house, intending that RK should be able to take it as an offering to his temporary mate. There was quite a bit of time before the Condor hit the next "black water," as Theophilus Becker liked to refer to the pleated, holey portions of space -where he found his best shortcuts. "RK? Hey, cat! Where the hell are you?"

 

He finally found the cat by the smell and the noise. Since acquiring the sack of horns, Becker hadn't smelted RK's particular perfume but right now C-deck reeked of it. Which reminded him that RK was once more a fully functional male cat with the begetting capabilities and prerogatives thereof, supposing there had been a lady cat who was interested.

 

Which fortunately there wasn't. Becker didn't even want to think of a ship with a whole bunch of little Roadkill clones playing hide and seek through the cargo.

 

Mean-while, if the cat was going to stink stuff up, Becker would just have to wear nose plugs or carry a hanky with something pleasanter to counter the stench-garlic maybe. If it worked with vampires, maybe it would work with cats.

 

It better, because Roadkill was damn sure going to stay fully equipped. No way was Becker going to go through that again. It made his two formerly missing and now mostly restored fingers ache just thinking about it.

 

Finally, the stink led him to the cat, claws scrabbling at the side of the cargo hold that opened to the outside. This hold had been the airlock of the hatch of an ancient model of Antirean space craft, and it fit well into a hole Becker had to fill during one of his impromptu redesigning sessions of the Condor.

 

"Mrrrrow!" RK said, looking up at Becker as if to say, "It's about time you got here, you damn fool. Help me out with this, huh?"

 

Becker had rigged a bin-style entry door to the hold that opened outward. The door was totally slimed with RK's personal signature testosterone blend.

 

"Okay, cat, why didn't you say so before?" Becker asked, but realized he had been busy at the controls when he wasn't sleeping. Besides which, RK was used to keeping his own counsel. He knew how to get Becker's attention when he wanted it. He had obviously just preferred to work on his own so far. Becker had to admit that he couldn't have improved on the job RK had done on the cargo hold door. It was well and truly slimed-a piece of feline artwork in its own way. Becker had to find a piece of cloth to wipe off the mess before he could punch the button that opened the hold.

 

The hold door fell open, rather than sliding. And lying on the inside of it was what looked like a dead man.

 

A familiar-looking dead man-and not just familiar looking. Becker knew who the fellow was from the torn and stinky pant leg.

 

"No wonder you were carrying on," Becker said aloud to Roadkill. "It's your old scratching post, hitching an unauthorized ride."

 

He put his hands under the android's armpits and started hauling him out of the cargo hold. There was a pulse. Funny. These older models didn't have a true circulatory system. There was something strangely familiar about that pulse though, and as soon as Becker hauled the guy back to the command deck and heard the little steady bleep again, he knew what it was.

 

"Well, RK, here's our little homing pigeon, giving away our position with every beat of his heavy metal heart. Shee-it. I wonder if you can hear this thing through wormholes?"

 

Kisia Manjari pitched a fit when she saw what had become of her mechanoid henchmen. "He killed them!" she told her uncle. "Smashed them with his junk then took off with one of them stole it. Stole my KEN unit! He can't get away with that-oh, no."

 

"Certainly not, my dear," Uncle Edacki said smoothly. He could see the scene in question on her portable comscreen.

 

"Most unwise of him indeed."

 

"I wonder why KEN640 doesn't answer when I try to reach him," Kisia said. "He is still operational, according to his sonid button. He should answer and obey my command to kill the junk man and bring his ship back here."

 

"Hmmm, perhaps," Uncle Edacki said. "But, Kisia darling, are you sure that would be the best use of this fortuitous situation?"

 

"What do you mean fortuitous? They were my units! Now who will help me assemble my fleet?"

 

"I'll get you some others. But for the time being, you say you are still receiving the signal from 640's sonid, and 640 is presumed to be with Becker in his craft going-where? To their next destination. Which will be-where do you suppose?"

 

"Back to where he found the horns?" she asked, the light dawning finally.

 

"And the sonid signal, with its tiny trail of electrons" "Will let me track him and everything!" Kisia said, very excited. "Oh, Uncle, may I?"

 

"Yes, sweetie. You are doing so well today-first finding the horns, then cleverly arranging for your unit to be captured so we can track Becker by the signal. Just for that you may handpick a crew and take command of the MQcu) in order to follow Becker's trail."

 

"Oh, Uncle, you are the best!" "Nonsense, my dear, you've earned the privilege." Edacki Ganoosh signed off with a feeling of satisfaction at a job well done. He would have his horns one way or the other now, both with Kisia tracking her android to find Becker s source, and then there was the little matter of sending the Pandora to follow a similar sonid implanted in certain key employees-such as Yasmin, who was even now emitting her signal from her hiding place aboard the Shahrazad.

 

Honestly, the things a girl had to do to get out of jail. Confronting her almost-ex-husband wasn't so bad-there had always been a better-than-average chance he might try to buy her off, if she had been able to act sad enough about poor dead Tapha. Well, she hadn't. Tapha was no great loss to anyone. And really, she would have almost paid for the opportunity to see Hafiz's face when he realized what the powdered horn was. That made up for all the cracks about her acting and dancing ability when they were married.

 

Actually, what with being supplied all the security codes she didn't already know, it had been no trouble to smuggle herself aboard the Shahrazad, like her bosses told her. It wasn't that Yasmin wasn't perfectly comfortable either, even though she felt that as Hafiz's senior wife she should have been occupying the master suite instead of the quarters generally assigned to the pedicunst. She chose those herself because, as the pedicurist was one of the lesser servants, her quarters were farthest away from those of the family and other crew members. Here Yasmin could be as inconspicuous as a little mousie while all the time the transmitters she would sprinkle about the Shahrazad could send signals back to her bosses so they could monitor its movement.

 

But what got to Yasmin was that it was just too, too cruel of the bosses to make her go along on a "honeymoon trip" with Hafiz and that big cow he had married, thinking to replace her.

 

Never mind. She'd fix the wedded bliss stuff. It had never been all that blissful for her. All those cracks Hafiz had made about which end she thought with, all that worry about trying to keep her looks so her rich husband wouldn't get ideas. Keep her looks, hah! To think of all the dieting she had done to keep her shape and here he was with that-that-rhino-whale in purple robes!

 

So even though she was supposed to keep a low profile and let the Shahrazad lead her bosses to the unicorn people planet, where the bosses would then put her in charge of punishing Hafiz and his new playmate, Yasmin couldn't resist playing a few little tricks. Well, if a girl couldn't turn a few tricks, the least she could do was play some, huh?

 

She had, of course, bugged the boudoir. She really couldn't imagine failing to do so. It was a standard security measure in the brothels. Kept the girls from cheating by keeping tips for themselves, or the customers from becoming enamored with a particular girl and trying to run off with her.

 

She was delighted, on hearing the pillow talk between her husband and his new "wife," that neither of them had told the other about their encounters with her. These little deceptions on their part opened many exciting possibilities for troublemaking on hers.

 

Her familiarity with Hafiz's tastes and habits helped, as well as Karma's penchant for "meditation" and believing her superstitious nonsense about dreams and communication from the dead, that sort of thing.

 

Yasmin might not be a brain but she was a very practical woman, in her own way, with no sentiment in her makeup. She believed in the physical, and in what she could buy and sell. If anybody thought she was jealous of Hafiz's new bride, or even of the lap of luxury Karina had fallen into, they should just think again. After all, she, Yasmin, had abandoned all of that to follow her personal star.

 

But she thought it was really insulting that Hafiz had been able to forget her, to replace her with someone he actually claimed to like better! She, Yasmin, was the unforgettable beauty, the succubus who haunted men's dreams. How dare another woman think she could fill Yasmin s place in Hafiz's bed!

 

Of course, despite her considerable premarital experience, Yasmin had been little more than a gifted amateur when she married Hafiz compared to what she knew now, but she couldn't imagine how, after tasting her own charms, Hafiz could so much as bear to look at that fat, ugly, insipid cow who was not fit to fill Yasmin's douche bag!

 

When Karina returned to her "meditation chamber" to consult her spirit guides, as she had done before, Yasmin hovered on the floor above, listening through the replicator that was connected in the same spot on the wall through both levels. She'd discovered how easy it was to hear Karina's spiritual rantings quite by accident while planting one of the transmitters in the replicator shortly after the journey began.

 

Karina tended to "meditate" out loud when nobody was around.

 

"Yoo hoo, Mr. Li! It is I, Karina, your dear friend and faithful follower. I ask you to manifest answers for me. Hafiz that's my husband, you know him, Hafiz Harakamian, you did business together in life? He wishes to know what you would have us do. You see, Mr. Li, I keep getting this image of you looking back over your shoulder. Are you disturbed, gentle spirit? Are you disoriented by this departure from your home planet? Or-" The fat woman paused and her voice quavered as she asked, "Are you trying to warn us somehow?"

 

Yasmin couldn't think of any reply to that so she waited. And waited.

 

So did Karina until she said finally, "Mr. Li, you know you can tell me. Come on, what is it that's troubling you? Funny, but I can't even get an image. It's as if there is some sort of interference in the ether. Oh well, perhaps you're not feeling very sociable today. Hmm. Are there any other spirit guides who wish to make contact? I am here to help you."

 

Yasmin's lips curled back in a snarl that would have earned her a severe scolding from her cosmetic surgeon for making unsightly creases in his work. While it was true that while in a vertical position, Yasmin was not an imaginative woman, she was after all an entertainer of sorts and as such had a highly developed flair for the dramatic. She wasn't about to pass up an opening like this one.

 

Wishing she had the gauzy veils she had danced with and discarded in one other old numbers, the better to haunt Karina with, she settled for letting her low voice rumble through the replicator. "Beeeewaarrre ..." she said, trying to sound all dead and ghostly.

 

"Well, yes," Karina said. "I do realize that I should beware of a great many things. I'm afraid you'll have to be a more specific er-entity. Can you tell me who you are? I've never encountered a haunted replicator before."

 

Yasmin was far too clever to give her own name, of course, especially since she had, very much in the flesh, confronted Karina, who nevertheless had failed thus far to mention the visitation to Hafiz. From that omission, Yasmin gathered that she must have been mistaken for one of Karina's less corporeal acquaintances. The fat idiot thought she was a ghost.

 

Yasmin quickly stripped her right ring finger of the four rings she had piled on top of the dinky gold wedding band in the shape of a snake Hafiz had bought for her and sent the wedding band down the replicator chute. On the inside of the ring was her name entwined with Hafiz's, and their wedding date. Yasmin hated to let go of even that insignificant amount of gold, but it would almost be worth Karina's weight in gold to see the stupid sows complacency shaken up.

 

Yasmin saw Karina's plump fingers with the medium amethyst ring surrounded by moonstones scrabble in the replicator bale and remove the ring. "Uh, thanks," she said. "A serpent-how, uh, emblematic of mother goddess, in a creepy crawly sort of way. But I am puzzled, oh spirit. I don't see what it has to do with anything."

 

Yasmin was trying to form a suitably cryptic clue, something to imply that Hafiz had murdered her and maybe a whole harem of other girls and kept their bodies locked in a subcellar someplace. Something like that to really put a scare into the smug little wifey. But before she could let out with so much as another ghostly moan, somebody knocked at the door. "Madame Harakamian, please join the master on the bridge and secure yourself for landing."

 

"Hearing and obeying," Karina declared.

 

Yasmin made haste to secure herself for landing as well. It would be very helpful if the lot of them left the ship so that she could have an opportunity to plant additional monitors throughout. She was having a certain amount of remorse about the ring now-gold was gold after all-but the stupid slut would probably lay it down somewhere soon and Yasmin would be able to retrieve it.

 

The Rushiman administrator, who was deep in negotiations with Rafik Harakamian, insisted on throwing a banquet for Rafik's uncle and his new bride. Hafiz had been instrumental in gathering the forces which helped Rushima repel the invasion of the Khieevi and it had been his ward, Rafik's "niece," who had purified the putrid waters of the planet and ultimately arranged for Dr. Ngaen Xong Hoa, the meteorologist turned weather manipulation wizard, to help heal the planet's climate.

 

That same climate had been damaged by Dr. Hoa's techniques, while the man was being coerced by another group foiled by Harakamian's niece. So it was for his connections, as well as his wealth and power, that Hafiz was made welcome on Rushima, and Hafiz, with his typical perspicacity, understood this distinction. He was uncharacteristically grateful, particularly in view of the possible threat to his ward, of whom he was as fond as he was capable of being.

 

His business with Rafik was of the first priority, however, and since he did not wish to discuss it in front of Karina, he had, with the complicity of the captain and his Rushiman relatives, made certain arrangements to keep his beloved busy while he was otherwise engaged.

 

Therefore, when they disembarked, Hafiz gave the captain a wink and the captain addressed Karina. "Wise and enlightened mistress, during your meditations I was in contact with my sister, who has settled here on this isolated world. The people here are in much need of spiritual guidance and insight. My sister, on behalf of a delegation of the particularly troubled, hoped perhaps that you would be so beneficent as to share your gifts with those most in need."

 

"Certainly, Captain, I would be happy to," Karina replied with a gracious nod of her head and a queenly wave at the ragtag populace assembled to greet them. "And since this is the request of a family member of yours, I will happily provide my services at a very great discount."

 

"Barter is the usual method of exchange here, madam," the captain said.

 

"Hmmm," Karina said. In the old days, when she travelled to fairs and festivals throughout her home world, she had acquired many small bits of jewelry and stained glass doodads, hand-carved salad forks and once, a Mytherian fang-cleaning device, in exchange for readings. Now that she was a person of considerable means, these things would be more of a liability than an asset to her well-ordered home.

 

"Very well, then. Captain, I'll tell you what. Suppose you arrange the means of payment. What I cannot use, because we are traveling and our space is somewhat limited at the moment, perhaps we can take credit for on future exchanges with these people. I have been given to understand that due to the turmoil caused by the recent wars, the crops have not been particularly plentiful. I would not wish to take food from someone's children at this time." And of course, at a later time, the pickings would no doubt be better.

 

"My lady is gracious, as always," the captain said. "I shall be happy to perform this task for my lady and for my sister's adopted people."

 

First, however, Rafik, quick and graceful as ever, sprang forward to plant a kiss on each of Karina's cheeks and each of his uncle's. Mercy Kendoro was beside him and she greeted Hafiz and Karina a bit more sedately. She was not as yet one of the family but Hafiz thought she would make a fine addition. Broad hips, good for making children. And rather lovely, in an otherwise delicate sort of way, and very clever, too. Rafik was choosing his wife far more intelligently than Hafiz himself had-the first time, at least. Hafiz noted this with relief as it was another sign of the boy's suitability for the responsibility of leading the House of Harakamian.

 

Karina and the captain separated from the group to greet the captain's sister, who had been briefed ahead of time, and her fellow seekers of enlightenment. The remainder of the crew was invited to the community hall at Rushima's chief settlement and Hafiz gestured that they should accept. After all, this trip was from all indications to be a fairly long one and who knew when another opportunity for shore leave might arise? They were to return in time for refueling and taking aboard a few more provisions to top off the ample quantities loaded aboard at Laboue.

 

When he could be sure they were alone, Hafiz filled Rafik in on the visit from Yasmin.

 

He did not, of course, come straight to the point, but told the story in proper narrative fashion, building suspense so that when he spread his hands in alarm to show his reaction to the powder Yasmin had blown in his face and how he had lost consciousness, Rafik, used to drama as he was, widened his eyes with alarm.

 

"I presume there is some point to this. Uncle, to drive you from your home and honeymoon and into space other than a visit by your former wife who wished you to sleep?" Rafik asked.

 

"Nephew, has the responsibility I have laid upon your shoulders caused you to become impatient and rude? I am coming to it, I am coming to it, and all shall be made clear. You see, I had the powder analyzed. In addition to the sleeping powder there was powdered horn-and the powder, as it touched an injury on one of the technicians analyzing it, healed that injury." Hafiz let the sentence hang in the air, where it would soak into his nephew's brain like rain into thirsty soil. "Linyaari horn? But how did they get it?" "Alas, Yasmin was not disposed to disclose such information, though had she not disappeared by the time I awakened, I assure you I could have persuaded her otherwise."

 

Rafik went quite pale for someone whose usual skin color was the same golden tan as Hafiz's. "Acorna?"

 

Hafiz shook his head, a small, careful gesture. He could see the horror and fury building in his nephew's eyes. "We do not know that, Rafik. The universe is wide-it could have come from anyplace. But just in case, Karina and I are making a social call upon Acorna's newfound kinsmen. We will use the charts prepared by Calum Baird and Acorna for their journey. Once we are sure all is well, we shall return."

 

"And if all is not well? " Rafik asked. "I should go with you." 

 

Hafiz shook his head and waved both hands in negation. "No, no, no, no, my nephew who is like a son to me, you are my heir, the new head of my household. Think of the many enterprises that would fail, the people who would lose their employment, the joy of our enemies, if both of us should perish. You are needed here. If there is a need, we will signal you."

 

"How? No one here has ever received a transmission from Acorna's home world. It is quite probable that our transmitters and other devices cannot penetrate the depths of space within which the Lmyaari planet is located."

 

Hafiz shrugged. "True, it is possible. But trust me, I will think of something. I was sailing among the stars long before your birth, puppy. I am a resourceful man."

 

"Also true," Rafik said. "But-"

 

"My son, is it not written in the Three Books that however small and randomly picked the pebble, if the aim is true and the intention firm, it may yet strike its mark?"

 

"Still, Uncle, I would feel better if you took an army of other pebbles with you."

 

"And if all is well with Acorna and the Linyaari? Do you think these people who so prize their privacy would welcome an army? Perhaps one old man and his nubile bride, perhaps even the crew of their ship, but an army? Do I remember incorrectly that these are people so peaceful they would not even fight the horrible Khieevi?"

 

Rafik smiled and laid his hand on his uncles shoulder. "Maybe I am wrong when I remember that an elder relative of mine was so frightened by clips of these same Khieevi that he would not leave his compound, much less go face them without an army behind him. Are you mellowing as you age. Uncle Hafiz?"

 

Hafiz shrugged and scratched his chin. "Perhaps. Or it could be that I do not think these Khieevi, horrors that they are, would have given Yasmin the horn powder without taking parts of Yasmin in return. Therefore I do not feel it is Khieevi with whom we are dealing.

 

"And I am also of the opinion that anyone less savage than the Khieevi can be bought off. And as my dear Karina does not seem to sense the possible harm to Acorna, I see this journey as both a way to reassure myself and her other adopted relatives of our girl's safety and as a splendid opportunity for commerce. One which I would not have sullied by the presence of an army, for who knows to whom each individual soldier owes loyalty? No, my son, this pebble must fly alone-in a manner of speaking. But my aim is as true as the charts drawn up by Acorna and your ugly senior wife, and my intentions, though more diversified than those of which the Three Books speak, are nonetheless pure. I remain convinced this is the best course of action. Karina and I and our handpicked staff will go alone. We will go cloaked and shielded, of course, and if we find danger, we will return for assistance."

 

Rafik continued to frown and Hafiz saw with amazement that it was not only Acorna he worried about but his wily Uncle Hafiz, who had chosen his nephew over his son not only because the son had stupidly gotten himself killed but because the nephew was the only family member who could outsmart him.

 

It brought a brief sentimental tear to Hafiz's eye, which he quickly blinked away as an unproductive waste of moisture. Perhaps he was mellowing. Ah well, that was what a new marriage and retirement were for. But now was not the time to relax his vigilance or dull his wit. He clapped Rafik on the back. "Come, my son, let us see how your new aunt fares at reading the fortunes of these farmers."

 

Karina had done readings on credit for four mangy chickens, a basket of half-spoiled assorted fruit, a primitive handmade wooden musical instrument whose tone much resembled that of a squealing pig, the squealing pig that resembled the musical instrument, and a set of tea towels embroidered with the patches of the various branches of the Federation service that formed the career path of the embroiderer, who was a burly bearded six-foot-two tractor mechanic with hair the color of butter and eyes like razors.

 

"Please," Karina said wearily to the captain. "I grow fatigued with the power of my visions. No more, please, no more."

 

"Just one, Madame Harakamian, oh please, just one," begged a young boy leading what appeared to be a very elderly and crippled individual who looked as if what was left of her hair had never made the acquaintance of shampoo. "My granny sorely needs to see you, ma'am. She's been waitin' on you for weeks and weeks. I'm sorry if we're late, but she has a mighty hard time gettin' around."

 

"Oh, come now!" Karina said, snapping just a teensy bit. She had been enjoying getting used to leisure and luxury, and these locals had put her through a very grueling day for a few pounds of garbage she would have had to have been very hungry to eat even at her poorest. "How could she have been expecting me for weeks and weeks? My husband and I decided on our journey quite suddenly, made first contact with anyone outside of our own staff only a few days ago, and have not actually been traveling for weeks and weeks."

 

"Nonetheless, ma'am, she was expectin' you. Granny has her ways, she has. Now then. Granny, sit a spell and visit with the purty lady."

 

Karina paused. He did seem a very bright boy, after all, and with excellent taste and eyesight, so she gestured to the chair vacated by the last seeker of enlightenment and the boy helped the crone be seated.

 

"Now then, Madame," Karina began, shrewdly guessing that the old lady probably didn't want to know when she was going to find her true love, "can I put you in touch with some departed soul of whose happiness you wish to be assured?"

 

The old woman fixed her with one clouded eye and one quite bright green one and said in an insultingly mocking voice, "No, Missus, you cain't put me in touch with some dead person. I can do that for my own self if I've a mind to."

 

Where do these people come up with their atrocious accents? Most of them had been required to have quite good educations before being allowed to settle here not so very long ago. And how did this woman get so old. Surely the original settlers would have had better genetic material than that!

 

The old woman, as if reading her mind, cackled at her. "No genes gonna keep me from lookin' old when I'm a hunnert and three years old, Missus. Kept me from bein' fat earlier on though. Looks good on you though, if I do say so, and pleases that husband of yours. Oh, good, here he is now. He can hear what I have to say to you, too."

 

Karina was glad for Hafiz's presence as he came to stand behind her, taking one other hands in his.

 

"If you don't wish me to contact the departed for you, then what is it you wish?" Karina asked very sweetly, considering.

 

"I wish you'd quit jawin' and let me tell you what I come to say. I want to put you in touch with the living, girly-girl. I reckon as how you and your man are off to help that horny headed gal come to save us from them buggers awhile back. It's your man been in touch with his dead, only she weren't dead, and she's been in touch with you, too."

 

"Why? What do you mean?"

 

"You got yourself a new golden ring in the shape of a pie'^on'iu serpent, ain't you?"

 

Karina dug in her pocket and pulled out the ring.

 

"Look inside of it, you darn fool."

 

Hafiz groaned and tried to snatch the ring away but, failing, covered the lower half of his face with one hand.

 

"Hafiz and Yasmin Forever Entwined," was inscribed on the inside of the band.

 

"A wedding ring?" Karina asked.

 

Hafiz groaned again. "Yes, beloved. I can explain, my heart."

 

Karina turned back to the place where the old woman and her grandson had been. The chair was empty, the table vacant. She looked at Hafiz, then, truly baffled.

 

"But-how did you-where did she go?" Karina asked Hafz and the captain.

 

"Where did who go, madam?" the captain asked. "The golden-aged woman who was just here? She and her grandson?"

 

"I saw no one like that, Madame Harakamian," the captain said.

 

His sister replied, "Machinist Johansson was your last reading, Madame. There's been no one here until Mr. Harakamian arrived."

 

Karina looked from one of them to the other. "You're wrong. There was a young boy and a very old woman just here. She said she was one hundred and three years old."

 

The sister exchanged looks with a couple of the other people who had already had readings. "It couldn't be."

 

"Couldn't be who?" Karina demanded. "Who was she? How did she know about the ring? Where did she go?"

 

It didn't occur to her that, as the psychic reader in the room, perhaps she should not have had to ask.

 

The captain's sister looked abashed. "I can't say for sure, Madame, but the only person ever did live here by that description was old Alison Ward as used to run the herb farm."

 

"Well, yes, Naima, but her grandson died in that avalanche years and years before old Alison passed on."

 

"Passed on?" Karina asked. "I'm sorry, but she was right here, sitting in this chair."

 

"Oh, old Alison will do that from time to time if she reckons there's something you need to know. Don't let it upset you none, ma'am," a rawboned farmer said gently. "It's just her way."

 

While the locals were all saying things like "you can't keep a good woman down," and "Alison always did have to get her two cents' worth in," they all nevertheless continued steadfastly to deny having seen the crone or her grandson. Karina, who found she was far more disturbed than she expected to be at having once more encountered what was apparently a quite genuine apparition, turned to Hafiz.

 

"But you saw her, didn't you, darling?"

 

Hafiz shook his head slowly, and pointed to the ring. "I do, however, behold that band, the very one I gave to my first wife, who up until recently I fondly believed to be dead. Tell me, Karina, where did you get it, and when, and why did you not mention it to me?"

 

There ensued a heated discussion-their first argument! as to why neither of them had told the other about Yasmin. Fortunately, Hafiz was not so distraught by his current wife's omission to mention encountering his first wife that he neglected to order the ship searched from stem to stern.

 

Yasmin, hardly the sort to trouble herself to escape through any possible handy ventilation systems, emerged, roughly escorted by three crew members and four or five enthusiastic locals. She smoothed her skirts against her thighs and glared at them defiantly.

 

"Get your hands off my husband, you fat bitch," she said to Karina.

 

Hafiz thundered, "All bear witness! Yasmin, I divorce you, I divorce you, I divorce you! There! Now, what were you doing aboard the Shahrazal and where did you get that powder you blew into my face?"

 

"Yeah, honey, what's the matter?" Karina asked in a voice she hadn't used since middle school. "Didn't you have the price of a flitter ticket? Is that why you stowed away?"

 

"I regret only that we did not discover your presence aboard before we landed," Hafiz said. "The customary punishment for stowaways is spacing. I would have greatly enjoyed pushing you through the lock with my own two hands."

 

"Bully!" Yasmin said. "You'll get yours when my friends catch up with you."

 

"Where did you get the powdered horn you blew in my face, daughter of evil but idiotic ifrits?"

 

"That's for me to know and you to find out," Yasmin said.

 

Hafiz turned politely to the planet's administrator and asked, "Have you a very dull axe, like the one you use to butcher wood for your fires, perhaps?"

 

"Sure thing, Mr. Harakamian."

 

While the administrator was sending for the required implement, Hafiz whispered to Rafik, "Already I regret the necessity for us to arrive unarmed among Acorna's people, to demonstrate respect for their customs and possibly their religious beliefs, you understand."

 

"Under these circumstances, I can understand that regret, Uncle," Rafik said.

 

"Alas, I was unaware of Yasmin's presence and her onboard activities. There are other ways to defend oneself than conventional weapons, of course. As you'll see when they bring me that axe. Nonetheless, I shall have to reevaluate our internal defenses in light of this breach of security."

 

When the axe arrived, it was handed to Hafiz, who bowed graciously to acknowledge the generosity of the person or persons who lent it to him. To the administrator he said, in a voice loud enough for all to hear, "I hope you have no quaint native customs forbidding the execution of criminals? I assure you, my former wife has been convicted on many counts of many heinous crimes."

 

"No, sir. Out this far from civilization, we don't have the luxury of bein' overly forgiving. You just go right ahead, sir."

 

Karina saw her husband accept the axe. He nodded to the captain and Johansson, who grabbed Yasmin s arms and maneuvered her into position, her neck exposed and pressed against a handy tree trunk.

 

Karina held her breath. She could not believe he would do this without recourse to judge and jury.

 

The crew and the settlers looked extremely calm about the matter, however.

 

Hafiz took in a deep breath and swung the axe back over his head.

 

Yasmin, who had known him in his younger and more impetuous years, did not take the situation at all calmly. "Wait! Stop! You can't do this!"

 

Hafiz lowered the axe and smiled. "Rest assured, seed of a syphilitic she-camel, that I can, and I shall unless you answer my questions."

 

"I don't know where the powder came from," she lied. "The lawyer who had me released from prison gave it to me. He told me to give it to you and then follow you."

 

"Follow me?"

 

"Well, hide myself on your ship." She reached into her decolletage and pulled forth what looked like a tiny jewel. "I've been wearing this, you see. So they could follow you."

 

"Follow me why?"

 

"I don't know-robbery, I guess." Hafiz raised the axe again and Yasmin squealed. "Aiyee! I -I don't think they know where the horn powder came from either. They wanted you to lead the way to the unicorn girl."

 

"Aha!" This made sense to him. They were business rivals, these patrons of his former wife, and wanted to make contact with the Linyaan for nefarious reasons. They hoped Hafiz would lead them to Acorna's people. That made very good sense.

 

 

"Administrator, perhaps you need a spare field hand," he said. "If you keep this one in chains, she may be useful to you. But keep her among women only. If she is left alone with men she will be on her back in the twinkling of an eye."

 

Yasmin spat at him but was led off to the detention cell, to be fitted for chain jewelry. Karina called after her, "Just think of how much karmic clearing you'll be doing, dear! It will stand you in such good stead in your next incarnation!"

 

"May it come quickly," Hafiz growled. He ordered the ship swept for further transmitters and four more were discovered.

 

Then the Harakamians and their crew turned their attention to the celebration being held in their honor. Karina wore something even more floaty and lavender and silver than usual and Hafiz thought he had never seen her looking more radiant. "You are a precious pearl among women, my love," he told her. "Lesser females would have upbraided me for concealing a not quite-former marriage."

 

She dimpled at him. "Hafiz, you are so cute sometimes. Obviously you meant to divorce her-and you did, once you knew she wasn't dead. I am attuned to the secrets of the universe, you know," she said. Besides, the servants gossiped, comparing the current Mrs. Harakamian to the last onefavorably, she was happy to hear. "I do know you'd been married before. I am only a little regretful for your sake that you chose someone with quite as many Pluto problems as that woman undoubtedly has. But then, we all have our lessons to learn, don't we?"

 

"Yes, my beloved."

 

Karina sighed and looked deeply into his eyes. "However, oh mountain of manhood, while you are not now a widower, or a bigamist, but instead have become a properly divorced man, you have nonetheless had your wicked way with me under the guise of a false marriage. I was never a legal wife and so now am only your concubine, your plaything, your-"

 

He looked back into her eyes, but his hands itched to make the contact more than visual. "A grave matter indeed, my sumptuous slave of scintillating salaciousness. One we should discuss immediately, perhaps, in our bower aboard the Shahrazadi"

 

"And shame me further before all of these good people?" she breathed, but took a step backward. "Oh, master, you are too cruel."

 

He snapped his fingers and the planet's administrator, Rafik, and the ship's captain all came running. "I wish to remarry my wife at once. Captain? Administrator? You will say the words."

 

"We're not on board at the moment, sir," the captain said. The administrator quickly stepped forward and said, "here is a ring"

 

Karina slipped off her amythest wedding ring and gave it to the man, who said, "By the power vested in me, I pronounce you man and wife."

 

"So it has been said, so it will be written, so let it be done," Hafiz said. "You are satisfied, my flower of feminine virtue?" "Not yet," she breathed and gave him a wink worthy of Yasmin during their heated youth. "But I expect I will be when we return to the ship."

 

Hafiz responded by kissing her hand repeatedly, his kisses going higher and higher, up her sleeve and onto her shoulders, portaging the wisp of fabric that covered the shoulder until he ended at her neck, at which time they were called to dinner.

 

The community hall was not quite large enough for all of the settlers who came from miles around to enjoy the party, so tables were set up outdoors. The weather was ideal for such alfresco dining, thanks to the manipulations of Dr. Ngaen Xong Hoa.

 

"Useful, this weather wizardry," Hafiz said, scratching his beard.

 

After a bit of preliminary table hopping, Hafiz, Karina, Mercy, and Rafik took one table, and were soon joined by Dr. Hoa and the planet's administrator. However, some matter or other required the administrator's attention and he was called away.

 

Dr. Hoa leaned in and spoke confidentially to the three members of the House of Harakamian. "I wish to go with you, Mr. and Mrs. Harakamian. My work is done here and indeed, I have repaired all of the damage I was forced to do while I was a prisoner aboard the Haven. My only wish now is to retire to a place where I will not be asked to exploit my discovery any further."

 

Before Hafiz could speak, Rafik raised his hand, palm out, to stop him, and said, "Uncle, I have known for some time of Dr. Hoa's wish to leave here for a place where he and his discovery will be safe. He wishes to go-where you are going, and regretted that he was not able to accompany our mutual friend there when the first opportunity arose." Rafik, of course, was deliberately employing vagueness and circumlocution in the event that the conversation was overheard. "Therefore, I took it upon myself to inform him of your destination."

 

"So long as he is the only one, nephew," Hafiz said with a nod to Dr. Hoa. A long journey with the man might provide Hafiz with the opportunity of convincing the doctor to allow the House of Harakamian to market some small portion of his enviable discovery. "Dr. Hoa is of course always welcome in my home, whether it be on land or in the cosmos." "You are too kind, sir."

 

"In fact, I have been pondering a certain dilemma that has occurred due to the tender sensitivities of my wife and me for the beliefs of our dear little Acorna and her people. Perhaps you will be able to advise me."

 

Dr. Hoa nodded, though he looked a little wary. Hafiz, however, felt certain that the simple homely solutions he was beginning to envision to his security problem would not be offensive to Dr. Hoa's beliefs, any more than they would be to those of Acorna s people.

 

As soon as the banquet was finished, they made their apologies and took off again. Dr. Hoa smuggling himself aboard with the crew to avoid embarrassing confrontations-or good-byes.

 

None of them were aware that the detectors used to find homing transmitters were unable to separate the signals given from the transmitter from those emitted by another similar device-such as a replicator.

 

 

Rocky Reamer and his children, shepherded by Khetala, arrived on Manganos moon base. Khetala had been concerned when she saw the children that they were leaving their home she was very big on children having a home, since she hadn't had one.

 

But Turi and Deeter fielded her careful questions about what they were leaving behind with questions about what lay ahead. They were tired of the nano-bug market, and had knocked around the planet with Rocky since they were babies, living in a motley collection of used recreational vehicles tastefully outfitted as combination bedrooms and merchandise warehouses for the jewelry and rocks. They each brought with them their few changes of clothes, a couple of their favorite stones, and, for Rocky, his tool kit, and left the rest for the other traders to scavenge.

 

Rocky didn't care. Possessions came and went. His family was with him and they were going to be safe, and that was what mattered. Not only that, but he had been able to help Becker and was helping the Lady Acorna and her extended family, and he was sure that was the right thing. To be able to be safe and do the right thing was a terrific combination, as far as he was concerned. He breathed a lot easier once Kheti's little craft left the planet, and he and the kids got a big kick out of taking the trip off-planet, the first they could remember, together.

 

Jana, Chiura, and the other children Kheti had protected while in the mines had heard from the communications officer of the day that their friend was returning to the base. They rushed forward to meet her. Reamer's kids jumped up and down in excitement to see so many other children jumping up and down, even though they weren't quite sure what all the fuss was about.

 

Close on the heels of the former child slaves were Acorna's "uncles," Calum Baird and Declan Giloglie, accompanied by Judit Kendoro.

 

Giloglie and Reamer exchanged cautious nods, acknowledging their long-ago acquaintance in a geology class, and Khetala made introductions and explained the situation, then asked Reamer to produce the horn.

 

Reamer hesitated for a moment. "Do you really think-in front of all these kids-I mean, it's pretty serious and from what I've heard they look at Lady Acorna as some sort of goddess."

 

Kheti's hard brown face turned up at him and she said, "These kids, as you call them, have already lost most of their illusions. If Acorna is truly in danger, they will want to know and they will want to help in any way they can. If this horn belongs to her or any of the other Linyaari, someone is going to find that we're plenty adult enough to make them pay dearly for harming our friends."

 

So Reamer showed the horn and everyone looked. Some wanted to touch it and some put their hands behind their backs and looked frightened. One girl, Jana, began to cry softly.

 

"I remember when I'd been beaten in the mines so badly I could hardly move and Acorna touched my wounds with her horn and healed me -it was the first comfort I had had in years and years. This just can't be hers, Kheti. It just can't."

 

Calum Baird regarded Reamer suspiciously. "Did you bring this straight to Khetala for her to bring it here?"

 

"Yes, sir, I did. Becker was having trouble with a lady who seemed to want to rob him or kill him, so he and the cat took off."

 

"I guess that would explain why he didn't come to us himself. That and the fact that if he thought the horns were valuable he'd want to secure his source," Baird said. "Who was the lady? Did your friend say anything about going to see Hafiz Harakamian by any chance?"

 

"No, sir. The lady, and I use the term loosely-I'm sorry to be so judgmental but it's true-is about three nuggets shy of a payload. Her name is Kisia Manjari. Her father used to be a big shot."

 

"We know all about her and her father," Baird said shortly.

 

"Oh." Reamer blinked. "Oh, of course you do. You guys and Lady Acorna helped bring him down, didn't you? Well, anyway, Becker and the cat figured they should make themselves scarce but he didn't say anything about visiting Mr. Harakamian. He said he knew you guys, though, so maybe he met him through your partner, Rafik."

 

"It's possible," Baird said thoughtfully. "Laxmi, can you secure a channel for us to talk to Rafik? Uncle Hafiz was headed for Rushima. Let's see if he got there."

 

They were told that the Shahrazad had just left, but that a spy had been discovered onboard. When Rafik told them who it was, Gill let out a low whistle. About the time his cousin Tapha had been killed, Rafik had regaled his partners with a few stories about Tapha's dear departed mother, Uncle Hafiz's first wife.

 

"So she's still alive, huh? That whole family is amazingly hard to kill," Gill asked. "Well, Yasmin's interference probably explains the unexpected journey Hafiz and Karina are taking in the middle of their honeymoon."

 

"Oh yes," Rafik said. "My honored aunt blew some powder in Uncle's face that turned out to have ground Linyaari horn as part of its chemical composition. You can well imagine where he's going now."

 

"Yes, but do you think it's wise for the Shahrazad to go alone?" Calum asked.

 

Raflk repeated the conversation he had had with Hafiz, adding that Dr. Hoa had gone with the Harakamians.

 

When the transmission ended, Judit was shaking her head. "I don't like it. I just don't like it at all. Maybe an army isn't a good idea, but Hafiz and Dr. Hoa going together-it just sweetens the pot for unscrupulous people like the Pipers daughter." She gave Kisia Manjari's father the nickname the enslaved children had called him when he was still an unknown evil controlling their destinies on Kezdet.

 

A moment later, the communication with Rushima was reestablished and Mercy Kendoros face appeared on the screen. "Judit? I think its about time we got in touch with our brother and the Starfarers, don't you think? If the Pipers daughter and some of his old network are able to penetrate even House Harakamian's defenses, we need to be thinking about security. Has anybody heard from Nadhari Kando?"

 

They continued talking about a lot of people, most of whom Reamer had only heard of, if that, in grave tones that suggested danger. It was way too heavy for Reamer. He'd done his job and brought the trouble to the attention of the people who should be able to fix it, and had managed to take himself and his kids out of harm's way. He didn't want to hear any more. He didn't want to know any more. He was a peaceful sort of guy who mostly minded his own business and let other people mind theirs.

 

All he wanted was a place to make his living and raise his kids without somebody trying to kill or imprison them. Security arrangements were best left to people who enjoyed being on red alert all the time. He personally was not one of them.

 

He drifted to the back of the throng of adults and children crowded around the comscreen. A boy too small to see over the heads of the others admired Reamer s belt buckle, which he was at eye level with.

 

"That's beautiful, mister. What's the stone?"

 

"Turquoise. Pretty rare now."

 

"I like the frame you put it in. Is that metal silver?"

 

"Yeah. I made it myself."

 

"Wow! I wish I could do that."

 

Reamer shrugged. "It's not that hard. I brought my tools and a few supplies with me. Want me to teach you how? "

 

"Boy, do I! I'd love to make something like that with an acornite in the middle. It would make me feel somehow-you know, closer to her."

 

And so Reamer and his kids stayed on Manganos moon. Reamer began teaching the other kids more about looking for gemstones and how to set them in precious metals. Baird and Giloglie looked in once in a while and expressed the wish that they had time to learn.

 

Khetala stayed, too, at the insistence of the Kendoro sisters, who felt the younger woman would be in danger from Kisia Manjari's contacts if she returned to Kezdet right away.

 

And then one day, while Reamer was teaching laser torch work to the little boy who had first expressed an urge to learn metalwork, a new ship called for landing clearance on Manganos. The duty officer, Jana that day, called out to the rest of the people in the com center, community hall, school, and administration building rolled into one, that it was the Haven and someone had better fetch Mercy-Rafik and Mercy had returned from Rushima by that time-and Judit. Their brother was aboard.

 

Reamer went over to the com station to see what all the fuss was about as the Haven docked, the hatch opened, and out poured dozens of children of all ages, plus one guy a little younger than he was and another guy a whole lot older, and very familiar.

 

"Johnny Greene!" Reamer cried when he saw his old friend.

 

"Well, I'll be, if it isn't Rocky Reamer!" Greene responded, pumping his hand and clapping him on the back. "Who set off enough blasting powder to get you into space after all these years? I thought your feet were rooted dirtside." Reamer explained.

 

He had first met Greene through some rock hound friends, years ago, and Greene had had him make a piece for some lady he was interested in back then. They'd hit it off and since then had run into each other off and on over the years when Greene was dirtside, where he liked to cruise the nano-bug markets, or needed another piece of jewelry, or had found some interesting mineral specimens he wanted to unload. Though up until now Reamer had been a wayfarer and Greene had been a spacefarer, their paths crossed often enough for them to know they liked each other. When you had similar interests and some of the same friends, it could be a pretty small universe.

 

"I didn't know you had any kids," Johnny said, when introduced to Turi and Deeter. "When did you get married?"

 

"Right after you were on Kezdet last," Reamer said, pretending to look only at the tops of his children's heads to hide the fast blinking he had to do when he talked about Almah. "We had a good life for a while there." He tried a grin and managed it. "Now Turi has to look after us."

 

"They're a handful, too," Turi said in a dry way that made Johnny laugh.

 

"But look who's talking," Reamer said, indicating the scores of young people and children that now swarmed into the building. "These all yours?"

 

"Not by a long shot," he said. "The Haven is a Starfarers ship. These kids are the survivors of the original crew. The ship took aboard some banditos pretending to be refugees, and they overpowered the adults in charge of the ship and spaced them. Fortunately, Calum there"-Johnny lifted his arm to wave at Baird who was crossing to meet him "and Acorna were able to help my buddy Markel liberate Dr. Hoa, who was being held by the bandits, and provide sufficient diversion that the kids of the original Starfarers' Council were able to regain control of the ship and do unto the bandits as they had done unto the Council. I was already aboard as tech crew and the bandits didn't bother me, so I was able to help Markel and the others when the opportunity came. Pal Kendoro also came aboard later to help out. He got a hail from his sisters and the whole ship felt like it was time for shore leave. So here we are."

 

Reamer shook his head, laughing. "Never a dull moment, eh, Johnny?"

 

"Not if I can help it. Though there were times when I wished life was a little less exciting, to tell you the truth,"   Greene admitted.

 

Later, in the dining hall, when the moon base community was taking its evening meal, the Starfarers Joined them. Adreziana, Pal Kendoro, Johnny Greene, his friend Markel, and other members of the Starfarers' Council sat at a table with Baird, Giloglie, Nadezda, and the Kendoro sisters. Normally the adult administrators spread themselves throughout the dining hall, making themselves available to hear any problems or complaints from the student/residents. But the kids were all aware by now of the Linyaari horns that had been found and everyone was anxious to make sure Acorna and her people were well and that no harm had come to them.

 

Reamer Joined the table at Baird and Gill's invitation. Khetala was there, too. He smiled at her as he sat down, but Kheti never seemed to smile. He thought that what had happened to her in the slave labor camps-and after-when she had been taken by the Didis must have been pretty horrible for her to be so grim.

 

The other kids from her camp had told him how she had protected them and taken heatings herself to save the younger, weaker ones. And then when she grew too big to work the mines, she'd been sold to the Didis. After Acorna freed her, she had gone right back to the house where she had been brutalized and raped, to help the other girls there learn skills that would let them earn their livings without having to sell their bodies.

 

Reamer felt ashamed that he had never actually considered that the girls he had occasionally enjoyed in the past might not be enjoying themselves at all, or what might have been done to them to make them flexible and willing parties to any whim he happened to have. His face flushed to match his hair every time he saw Kheti now, or found her looking at him.

 

Turi and Deeter were at another table that had been joined by some of the younger Starfarers. His kids were listening wide-eyed to the adventures the travelers were telling about their most recent journeys. Poor kids. He had never had the wherewithal to take them off Kezdet. He had been so terrified, after Almah's death, of ending up unable to support them and having them taken from him and sent to the camps.

 

"Rocky, would you tell 'Ziana and Pal what you told us about the horn?" Judit Kendoro asked. The horn Reamer had brought with him was making the rounds of the table.

 

He repeated his story. The frowns of the Starfarer captain, her advisors, and the council members deepened as they listened.

 

"You say your uncle has gone to find Acorna alone?" 'Ziana asked Rafik. She was a bright young lady and not hard to look at. Reamer thought. He could see Pal Kendoro shared his opinion.

 

Rafik nodded. "It's a big ship but he took no extra weaponry with him, for fear of alienating the Linyaari. Of course, his people are all well trained at hand-to-hand combat, and the ship is equipped with certain long range weapons that would be almost impossible to disable. Still, for threats like the one posed by Yasmin or her employers, he doesn't have much protection. I could see that it worried him, but he told me he would deal with it." Rafik shrugged. "If anyone can take care of himself in a wade variety of circumstances, it's Hafiz."

 

"Still," 'Ziana said, "they should have some backup. Not to invade narhii-Vhiliinyar, of course, but just to make sure they don't come under attack."

 

"I wish Mr. Li's forces were still available to us," Pal said. "House of Harakamian has that kind of resource," Rafik said. "But I don't think Uncle would appreciate it if I undermined his decision by sending an armed escort after the Shahrazad."

 

"No," Mercy said. "It would be hard for Acorna's people to understand that an unarmed Harakamian arriving on their world followed by an armed House of Harakamian escort is not the same thing as an armed Harakamian. Besides which, the course mapped out by Calum and Acorna to narhii-Vhiliinyar is not common knowledge. It shouldn't be."

 

"We could go," 'Ziana said. "We're known to Acorna and the people who were with her. Even though we're armed, we've a shipload of children. We won't be suspected of trying to incite a war or coerce anyone, but we could still guard Rafik's uncle."

 

"We owe Acorna and all of you big time," Markel said. "Not only for helping us free ourselves from our parents' murderers, but for healing our wounded and helping us restore the good name of the Starfarers by taking Dr. Hoa to repair the damage his weather-control device had done while we were controlled by Nueva Fallona and her Palomellese gang."

 

Pal interjected, "That's true enough, Markel, but even though the current crew of the Haven has won a couple of battles and has some weapons, you're not an army or a police force. And as you yourself said, you are, when all is said and done, a ship whose crew is mostly comprised of children."

 

"That's to our advantage though," 'Ziana pointed out. "We're Starfarers. We go everywhere and everyone knows it. No one will suspect we're deliberately guarding the Shahrazad. They'll believe us if we say it was a chance encounter."

 

"I see that," Pal said, "But we're still not soldiers or police. Many of our number are still under twelve."

 

"Some of the fiercest fighters in history have been kids," Markel said.

 

Kheti had been very silent, but now she said, "It's good to know how to fight to protect yourself and others but Pal is right. We are none of us professional fighters and if Kisia Manjari and her uncle are using some of the same network her father once employed, they are very professional indeed."

 

"Training is all we need," 'Ziana said. "That and maybe a little advice. And the coordinates where you believe the Linyaari home world to be, Mr. Baird. We won't need your course." She glanced at Johnny Greene. "We Starfarers have our own methods of navigating."

 

The Council members were all nodding. Reamer could see Pal and the others were outnumbered. Pal sighed and said, "Okay, but if/^w adviser could give one more piece of advice the one member of Mr. Li's staff who is still available, as far as I know, is Nadhari Kando. If you have to have one trainer and adviser, she's the one."

 

"The last I heard, she was staying in General Ikwaskwans compound, helping train his troops," Mercy said.

 

"Now, that's handy," Pal said. "If we need extra fire power it's right there. We could apprise the general of the situation, too. With your authorization, Rafik, we could retain the Red Bracelets on a standby basis in case your uncle runs into further problems."

 

"That's a good idea. Pal," Rafik said. "Meanwhile, I can speak with Federation officials about possible sentient rights violations. Trafficking in the horns of non-Federation peoples known to be sentient surely must break some kind of law."

 

"And I can get the authorities on Kezdet off their duffs and launch an investigation into Ganoosh's illegal activities," Gill said.

 

"I think someone could just try using the secure channels on the com lines instead of everyone going rushing off into space," Judit suggested.

 

Calum shook his head. "I wondered why Hafiz didn't do that instead of seeking out Rafik in person. Even when he spoke to me, he used a kind of personal code. I realized that he suspected his own security had been breached. As a precaution, I took a look at our equipment and programs. They're all  manufactured by Kezdet-Kom, which is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Interlay Enterprises, which is owned by a company owned by Ganoosh. Our security programs are manufactured by another of his puppets."

 

"Just can't get good help these days," Gill growled.

 

"We'll go find her," 'Ziana rejoined

 

Kheti said, "I'm going with you. Pal has been out of the camps too long. I can identify quite a few of Manjari's perverts for Nadhari and the general if they need me to. If the Piper's cronies are causing trouble again, I want to personally make sure they're stopped. None of us will be safe until that whole machine is destroyed, once and for all."

 

"I think that's a little beyond the scope of our mission, Khetala, but you're very welcome," Markel said. The other council members nodded assent.

 

"Daddy, we should go, too," Turi said. Reamer had been so engrossed in watching the proceedings that he hadn't noticed his kids had wandered over to stand behind him, where they had apparently been taking in every word. "The horn is ours. Mr. Becker gave it to us to help the Lady and her people. We should be the ones to take it to them."

 

Reamer didn't much like conflict of any kind and the idea of kids doing battle with people like Edacki Ganoosh scared the living daylights out of him. But so did the idea of his kids being plucked up like ripe fruit for Kisia Manjari and her uncle to use as they wished.

 

If there were going to be lessons for youngsters on how to take care of themselves from a former captain of the notorious Red Bracelets like Nadhari Kando, Turi and Deeter should be in on them. Him, too. Not that he'd be much good at combat. But maybe he could repair weapons or something. Bound to be able to make himself useful one way or the other. And it sounded like a wild adventure.

 

Johnny Greene clinched it by growling into his ear, "If the manure hits the ventilator in Kezdet, you and the kids will be well out of harm's way coming with us to see Nadhari and the general. You don't think the Kendoros and Acorna's uncles would agree to the Starfarers taking on the recruiting mission unless they thought that was the best way of keeping the Starfarers our of harm's way, do you?"

 

"Yeah," Reamer said, hoping he wouldn't be sorry. "Count us in,too."

 

The entire city-or village, as it seemed more to Acorna-was filled with the sound of people bidding farewell, the sight of people touching horns, and a long hue trudging up to the spaceport, duly accompanied by the Ancestors at their deliberate pace which would make any space traveler itch for warp speed. In a matter of an hour or two, the Faberge egg crate spaceport was emptied of ships.

 

Grandam Naadiina, who had been so reassuring the night before, looked suddenly much older as she gazed skyward watching the eggs bounce into the air and disappear beyond the clouds. Then she became very busy about her quarters for quite a while. Maati's lower lip trembled. "What if they don't come back? " she asked aloud.

 

"The whole fleet? Not come back? Don't talk foolishness, child," Grandam said briskly, but Acorna knew the old lady was as upset as the child.

 

Thariinye appeared at the open flap. "Just thought I'd check up on you ladies. Liriili felt it was important that at least one responsible, well-traveled male remain dirtside to look after the women and children and show a bit of leadership for the other males."

 

Grandam's mouth quirked with annoyance.

 

Thariinye continued. "Of course, I could have had my pick of berths, but I wished to honor Liriili's wishes. The poor lady is overwhelmed right now with so much happening."

 

"She's hardly the only one," Grandam said sharply. "Khomya was going to go visiting this morning but I hardly think people will be in the mood for guests. Perhaps this would be a better time for her to see the compound of the techno-artisans. Thariinye, perhaps you could demonstrate a bit of that sterling leadership capability of yours by showing Khomya the way?"

 

"Certainly, Grandam," he said with an eagerness that indicated spending time with Khornya was exactly what he washed to do.

 

The walk was not long but it was very dull. Thariinye went on at great length about his importance in different organizations and families. Acorna saw some long blue grasses she would have liked to ask about, but he was in the middle of a story of how he came to be elected the garange of the Order of the Irriinje, which he did bother to explain was the name for a noble bird which, on the home world, had lent its name to the similarly noble members of the organization. His babble was annoying, but she knew him well enough to realize it was partly because while the emergency had galvanized him to action, there was no action required of him. His nervous energy had nowhere to go. Had she not had so much else to worry about herself, she might have reacted the same way.

 

Once they reached the techno-artisans' compound, however, the trip became very interesting indeed. The pavilions were as large as landing bays and had a great deal of shiny machinery and many comscreens, plus huge bins of various metals, rocks, and gemstones. Acorna was enthralled by the central area of the huge main pavilion, where a large eggshaped spacecraft in the process of having its outer decoration applied brooded over the bustling techno-artisans. It rather looked as if the egg was presiding over the chicken yard, instead of the other way around.

 

"The hull was shaped two pavilions over," the artisan in charge told her. He was a fraternity brother of Thaarinye's and had been introduced to her as Naarye.

 

Beyond the ship under construction, in the background, sat two gigantic hulls, their hatches gaping and cavernous. Hulking as they were, they had escaped her notice at first, as other work proceeded in front of them and regardless of them, as if they weren't there. Unlike the ship in the middle, which looked like a flitter by comparison, the leviathans had plain dark paint jobs with no decorations.

 

"I've never seen such large ships used by the Linyaari," Acorna said. "What are those for? Are they here for repair? Is that why they aren't up at the port?"

 

Naarye shook his head. "Now those are a piece of Linyaari history, Lady. It just happens that right now they're a piece nobody wants to look at. They're the two big evacuation transports that brought the people of our fair city from Vhiliinyar to Kubnhkhan. The port was built after we arrived, and they're too big to fit up there; besides, nobody much wants to look at them. It takes a crew of at least twenty people fully trained and checked out on that particular model to fly them and far more fuel than we could scrape together at a moment's notice."

 

Acorna could only imagine that the monster ships would need to escape the planet's gravity well.

 

"We could have them operational again if we absolutely had to, but it would take time and plenty of muscle to tune up the drives, fuel the vessels, and get them out of here, especially if we hope to leave both them and the pavilion intact. We keep them here because it gives our people a little sense of security knowing they're available, but at the same time, the people don't want to be reminded they might need them again."

 

Naarye was being more than polite to her but he, too, was clearly affected by giving the transport ships too much attention, so Acorna returned his courtesy by changing the subject.

 

"I'm fascinated by the decorations on the ship you're working on and the others I've seen. The BaLikilre's pattern, for instance, was quite different. Do you determine the designs personally?" she asked. The craft in front of them was being adorned with multicolored panels forming a sort of flame pattern, outlined in what appeared to be gilt.

 

Naarye beamed and waved his hand in a lordly way toward the spacecraft. "Handsome, isn't it? It is the pennant pattern of Clan Haarilnyah, the oldest clan extant among us. In answer to your question, we"-and here he said a word in Linyaari which was unpronounceable to Acorna, even though she was becoming more facile with Linyaari every day. She understood it to mean outer hull embellishment specialists "adapt the designs for the hulls from the pennants of a clan or an individual distinguished enough to have a personal banner. We are doing it in rotation according to both their geographical and astrological position on Vhiliinyar in relation to the moons and also according to historical date, in inverse order. We keep very strict records. No one must be offended."

 

"Of course not," she said. "I'm afraid I don't yet have enough of a grasp on how your-our-society works to understand the importance of the order you mention, but I'm sure it's very fair."

 

"Actually," Naarye said with a twinkle, "it's entirely arbitrary and meant to sound as complicated as possible so that if anyone takes offense because their pennant has not yet been represented, we can make a baffling enough excuse that they will get off our backs, grateful not to have to hear the explanation of how a geographical and astrological position can be plotted according to moons we can no longer observe and translated to some sort of time order sequence. This lets us do whichever design strikes us as prettiest and most appropriate for the ship at hand."

 

She chuckled.

 

Naarye, pleased at the reaction to his wit, gave Acorna a frankly curious glance. "So you are still learning our ways, then, aren't you?"

 

"Yes," she said.

 

"I saw you at the reception last night but didn't get a chance to say hello," he told her. "Before the evacuation I worked with your father on the development of some defensive weapons against the Khieevi. Unfortunately, your family disappeared and the invasion struck before we could test them. He and your mother were fine people, though."

 

"Thank you," Acorna said.

 

"Did you know that your great-grandmother was responsible for the design of our ships?"

 

"She was?" Acorna asked, and found she was eager for more information about her family. "What was her name? Did she travel off-planet to study, too? Did she have many children? And what would her pennant have been like?"

 

The artisan smiled. Like her, and the majority of people in this pavilion, he was white-skinned and silver-maned. His features were not quite so regular as Thaarinye's, however, and the skin of his face had a rather rough, dry appearance, with ridges where his goggles lay against his cheeks and brow, just beneath the horn. His hands were blackened, too, and his clothing speckled with pigment-purple and fuschia on the top layer, along with bits of glittery stuff.

 

He answered, "Her name was Niikaavri of Clan Geeyiinah. She didn't find a lifemate till late in life, I understand, after she had been traveling in space, learning of alien technology and studying for many ghaanyi. She designed the first egg ship with the outer hull in the pennant of her lifemate, as a bonding gift. Her own pennant-ta da! -you see before you."

 

"Odd that it wouldn't have been one of the first," Acorna said.

 

He wagged a finger at her. "Don't you start on me, too. The truth is, she never knew what it looked like. Distinguished historical persons are often awarded a special pennant posthumously. This one is a fairly recent design actually not conceived until we left Vhiliinyar and came to this world. You do understand, don't you, that besides beautification, outer hull embellishment has a very serious function as heat and friction shielding material?"

 

"No, I didn't know that."

 

That information and other new ideas she gathered as she talked to the techno-artisans intrigued Acorna throughout her tour of the fascinating if baffling processes and techniques performed by the artisans. The most entertaining artisans were those who stamped the large casings and decorative moldings-they performed this function with both hands, equipped with a special glove that joined the fingers in a single block on the end, and feet, and their work resembled a kind of wild stomp dance that they did with great concentration and precision, but also with a touch of amusement at their own antics. Acorna clapped appreciatively and they bowed toward her before returning to their work.

 

In the next building, the artisans were busy designing flitters. "Oh, so you are going to get them?" she asked.

 

"Oh, yes," the designer told her. "We have the prototype nearly complete. It's non-polluting, and very beautiful to behold. Once its finished and we have customized the model, we will return it to Kaalin where it will be manufactured, then shipped back to us fully assembled."

 

Acorna admired the design, which made a Linyaari riding in one of the airborne vehicles look as if he were a winged creature, the wings spreading out just behind the rider's shoulders, at the joining of the clear overhead canopy with the body of the flitter. The wings were purely decorative of course, but decoration was no small part of technology to the Linyaari, Acorna was learning. Everything the Linyaari artisans made was stunningly beautiful.

 

Speaking of beauty, Thariinye was quite a favorite with the younger females who worked in the compound. Acorna almost feared she and Thariinye would be asked to leave because of the disruption he caused among them. But the techno-artisans seemed glad of the distraction. She spoke with many of them about their relatives or friends who were studying or trading on other planets, and their worries were almost palpable.