Children of God

37 N’Jarr Valley 2085, Earth-Relative

"SHETRI, I THINK, MIGHT HAVE MANAGED TO MAINTAIN HIS ANONYMITY, but there was something unmistakably Jana’ata about my foster son," Suukmel told Sean Fein many years later, recalling Rukuei’s account of that journey. "So they fell back on Kajpin’s story: that Rukuei was a follower of Athaansi Erat, captured while attempting to prey on a village. They claimed Shetri was a bounty hunter—a man who traded his tracking abilities to the police in exchange for meat from executed Runa felons. They were bringing Rukuei to Gayjur to be questioned about the location of the northern raiders."

Some Runa the party encountered took the opportunity to fling stones at a safely vanquished enemy, or to shout abuse. Still others let fly random kicks that Tiyat and Kajpin fended off with casual efficiency but no great emotional heat that would give the deception away. Before they reached the northernmost navigable tributary of the Pon river and had taken a short-term lease on a private powerboat, Rukuei had tasted the salt of his own blood from a broken tooth. But there was an old man, a Runao, who followed the four of them for a long time. Curious, they decided to wait for him one morning.

"He told them that he had never known he could get so old," Suukmel remembered. "Rukuei was very moved by this."

"Someone’s bones hurt," the old man had said. "Someone’s children went off to the cities. Let the djanada take this one!" this Runao begged Tiyat. "Someone is tired of being alone, and of hurting."

Tiyat looked at Kajpin, and they both turned to Rukuei, who had not eaten Runa for years. Kajpin’s hand shot out and pushed Rukuei theatrically forward along the road. "Right," Tiyat agreed loudly, dismissing the old one. "Let the djanada starve." But Rukuei felt it would uncover no lie if he called out to the old man, "Thank you. Thank you for offering—" and stumbled again as Shetri cuffed him.

"There were genuine allies in some places," Suukmel told Sean. "Now and then, people offered a night’s shelter, or hid them in a shed and told Rukuei and Shetri of some long dead Jana’ata who had been kind. But there were few, very few of these. Mostly there was indifference. Vague curiosity occasionally, but commonly a bland inattention. My foster son was very impressed by this: the Runa were living their lives as though we had never existed."

"The people of the third Beatitude have well and truly inherited the world, my lady, and they acquired a grand, high opinion of themselves while they were at it. You Jana’ata spoil the illusion," Sean told her. "So they pretend that you were never important to them."

The Jana’ata are alone, Sean thought then, like godlings whose believers had become atheists. In his own soul, he knew with sudden certainty that it was not rebellion or doubt or even sin that broke God’s heart; it was indifference.

"Don’t expect gratitude," he warned Suukmel. "Don’t even expect acknowledgment! They’re never going to need you again, not like they did before. A hundred years from now, you may be nothing but a memory. The very thought of you will fill most of them with shame and loathing."

"Then we shall truly be gone," Suukmel whispered.

"Perhaps," this hard man said. "Perhaps."

"If you have no hope for us, why have you stayed?" she demanded. "To watch us die?"

Perhaps, he almost said. But then Sean remembered his father, eyes shining with the unadulterated glee that Maura Fein had loved and shared, shaking his head at some ignominious example of the human capacity for boneheaded, self-inflicted calamity. "Ah, Sean, lad," David Fein would say to his son, "it takes an Irish Jew to appreciate a cock-up this grand!"

Sean Fein gazed for a time at the pale northern sky, and thought of the place where his own ancestors had lived. He was a Jesuit and celibate, an only child: the last of his line. Looking at Suukmel’s drawn, gray face, he felt at long last compassion for the fools who expected fairness and sense—in this world, not the next.

"My father was the son of ancient priests, my mother the daughter of petty kings long gone," he told Suukmel. "A thousand times, their people might have died out. A thousand times, they nearly killed themselves off with political bickering and moral certainty and a lethal distaste for compromise. A thousand times they might have become nothing but a memory in the mind of God."

"And yet they live?" she asked.

"Last time I looked," he said. "I can’t swear to more than that."

"And so might we," Suukmel replied, with frail conviction.

"Shit, yes, y’might at that," Sean muttered in English, remembering Disraeli’s wee couplet: How odd of God / to choose the Jews. "My very much esteemed lady Suukmel," he said then in his strangely accented K’San, "one thing I can say for certain. There’s just no telling whom God will take a liking to."

38

Rakhat: Landfall

October 2078, Earth-Relative

EVEN IF F SFAN FEIN HAD HARBORED ANY ILLUSIONS ABOUT THINGS MAKING sense on Rakhat, he’d have lost them all to the near oblivion he achieved during the hours before the Giordano Bruno party made landfall.

As beautiful as he found the laws and workings of chemistry, the physics of flying defeated him, and Sean always expected his innate pessimism to be rewarded by the flaming crash of whatever aircraft he was on. So he had hoarded his last bottle of Jameson’s for this occasion, and spent his final hours on the Bruno preparing himself spiritually to meet his Lord and Savior with an apology for the whiskey on his dying breath.

Weightlessness and chill dominated the first stage of the descent from the vacuum of space. There was a brief, blessed interval of low gravity and growing warmth, but that was followed by perceptible acceleration. As they entered the atmosphere, the lander began to vibrate, and then to buck like a small boat in a dirty sea.

Alcohol failed him. Nauseated and cotton-mouthed, Sean spent the balance of the flight alternately invoking the Virgin’s intercession and chanting, "Fack, fack, fack," like a litany, with his eyes closed and his palms stinking. Just when it seemed it couldn’t get any worse, they hit a wall of bad air left over from the last tropical storm to move through the region, and as the entry heat grew in ferocity, his body fought crazily with its own autonomic nervous system: ice-cold with terror and sweating to stave off fever.

Which is why the first man from the Giordano Bruno to set foot on Rakhat was not Daniel Iron Horse, who was the mission’s superior, or Joseba Urizarbarrena, an ecologist aching for his first glimpse of this new world; not Emilio Sandoz, who knew the place and would react most quickly to danger, or John Candotti, determined to be at his side, in case disaster struck again; nor was it the would-be conquistador Carlo Giuliani or his bodyguard Niccolo d’Angeli. It was Father Sean Fein, of the Society of Jesus, who pushed his way to the front of the queue and exited the lander the moment the hatch opened, stumbling forward a few steps and falling gracelessly to his knees, where he threw up for a good two minutes.

They might have hoped for a more auspicious beginning to their stay. Sean at least managed to arrange for the first words spoken by a member of their mission to be a kind of prayer. "Dear God," he gasped, when things slowed down, "that was a shameful waste of good liquor."

IT WAS ONLY WHEN SEAN SAT BACK ON HIS HEELS AND HAWKED AND SPAT and caught his breath that any of them looked beyond his distress to the high plateau south of Inbrokar City, which Sofia Mendes had recommended as their landing site.

"I had forgotten," Emilio Sandoz whispered, walking as they all did now away from the lander’s ticking-hot hull, away from the stench of burnt fuel and vomit, into the redolent wind. "I had forgotten."

They’d meant to come earlier, just after the first of Rakhat’s suns had risen, before the steaming heat of full day, but the weather was more than usually unstable this time of year and storms had delayed landfall twice. Finally, Frans had identified a break in the rains and Carlo had decided to go down, even though it would be close to second sunset when they landed.

So they had by accident arrived on Rakhat at the most beautiful time of day, when the late afternoon chorale of wildlife announced its existence to an unheeding world intoxicated with its own luxuriance. To the east, the far landscape was veiled by sheets of gray rain, but there were two suns low behind them, just above the white limestone escarpment that helped contain the Pon river, and these lit up the near country brilliantly, making an immoderate world sparkle like a pirate’s jewel box: all diamond raindrops and golden clouds, its wanton foliage amethyst and aquamarine and emerald, its extravagant blossom citrine and ruby and sapphire and topaz. The very sky flared like opal: yellow and pink and mauve, and the azure of the Virgin’s robes.

"What is that scent?" John asked Emilio, standing next to him.

"Which one?" Joseba cried, agriculture’s depredations forgotten in the languorous panorama of lavender savannah. There was a lifetime’s work within a few paces of where he stood. The soil alive with tiny vertebrate fauna, the air teeming with flying things, membranous wings flashing as they wheeled in the sunlight. Overwhelmed by the sheer volume of data, Joseba could hardly keep himself from staking out a square meter and beginning the research that very moment; he needed to contain it somehow-divide it, tame it, know it.

"It’s like a perfume shop!" said Nico.

"But there’s one scent, especially," said John, searching for words. "Like cinnamon, except-more flowery."

"Yes, exquisite," Carlo agreed. "I recognize it—there were ribbons with that scent in the shipment the Contact Consortium stowed on board the Stella Maris when they sent Sandoz back."

Emilio looked around and then walked to a patch of low-growing bushes a few paces away. He picked a trumpet-shaped blossom, its petals the hallucinatory scarlet of a poppy, and held it out to John, who leaned forward to inhale. "Yeah, that’s what I’m smelling. What’s it called?" John asked, offering the blossom to Sean, who backed away, still feeling rocky.

"Yasapa," said Emilio. "And yasapa means?"

John pulled the pieces apart. Ya s ap a… "You can make tea with it!" he translated triumphantly.

Pleased with his pupil, the linguist nodded as Carlo reached for the flower, carrying it with both hands to his face and inhaling deeply. "The Runa fill a glass jar with the blossoms, cover them with water and set it in the sun—too sugary for my taste," Emilio said, "but they add sweetleaf to the tea as well. If you leave it long enough, it ferments. You can distill that for a kind of brandy."

"Just as I predicted!" Carlo crowed triumphantly. "We’ve been here less than half an hour and you have already paid for this entire expedition," he told Sandoz, looking at the blossom. "Beautiful color—" He paused, and then sneezed violently.

"Crisce sant’," Nico intoned.

Carlo nodded, and tried again, "Is the brandy th—" He stopped, mouth open, eyes closing, and this time there was a series of sneezes, with Nico blessing each small detonation. "Thank you, Nico, I think I’m sufficiently sanctified," Carlo said. "Is the brandy this color?" he finally managed to ask before sneezing again. "God," he cried, "I can’t be coming down with a cold!"

"It’s that damned flower," said Sean, lip curled at the cloying odor.

"Or the lander fumes," Danny suggested.

Carlo shook his head in amazement, and managed to continue his thought. "Is the brandy this color as well? The demand would be huge—"

"Just don’t let the Jebs in on the deal," Danny warned as Carlo abandoned himself to an artillery barrage of sneezing. "The only time we ever tried to run a winery, we lost money on it. On the other hand, it might be fun to give the Benedictines a little unhealthy competition—"

Carlo was now staggering backward, as though jet-propelled. "Possa sa’ l’ultima! he gasped with his hands over his mouth, which felt bizarrely numb. His eyes were starting to itch and water. "Drop the flower," he heard Sean say. "Get it away from your face!" Sandoz ordered. And Carlo did so, but the sneezing continued unabated, and his eyes were swelling shut…

"This is the last time I go on a package tour with you guys," John was griping. "Sean throws up, Carlo’s allergic to flowers—"

"Padrone, is something wrong?" Nico asked. When there was no answer, Nico turned to Emilio and asked again, "Is there something wrong?"

Everything began happening at once: Emilio yelling, "Get the anaphylaxis kit! Run, for crissakes! He’s going down!" Carlo hitting the ground, each breath a separate struggle to suck air past a rapidly constricting pharynx. Danny dashing back to the lander for the ana kit. Emilio barking at John, "Get him on his back! Start CPR!" Then Carlo turned blue and Nico’s fright turned to sobs. Sean tried to calm him, but Emilio turned away from the grief, arms across his chest, and paced for a few moments before glancing back to see Joseba take over the rhythmic effort to restart Carlo’s heart when John began to flag. "Danny—come on!" Emilio yelled as Iron Horse skidded to a halt and dropped to his knees next to Carlo’s lifeless body. "The red syringe," Emilio said, his voice low and tense as he watched Iron Horse dig through the kit. "Yes! That’s it. Right into the heart. We’re losing him—"

But even as he spoke, Carlo’s color pinked and the gasping breaths started to come again without Joseba’s aid. Suspended in time, they all watched silently as the hit of epinephrine took hold. "Jesus," John whispered. "He was dead."

"All right," Emilio said, coming to life himself, "get him into the lander and lock it down—he’s still exposed out here."

"Nico," Sean said evenly, "be a good boy and clear a space for Don Carlo on the deck, please."

Bleary-eyed and scared but always ready to obey a direct order, Nico ran ahead to open the cargo-bay door while John, Sean and Joseba carried Carlo to shelter. "If he stabilizes, that may be all he needs," Emilio was telling Danny as they dogtrotted behind the others. "But if he goes under again, try aminophylline, yes?"

By the time they had the lander systems reactivated and the filters began cleaning the interior air, Carlo was coming around. " — ole atmosphere must be drenched in pollens and danders and God knows what else," he could hear Joseba point out. But Sandoz said, "No, it must be yasapa. Anaphylaxis takes at least two exposures, and he recognized the scent—" Throat still constricted and eyes puffed shut, Carlo struggled to sit up; someone took him under the arms and pulled him to his feet, maneuvering him into a flight seat. Drained and disoriented, he whispered, "That was certainly exciting."

"Yes, indeed," he heard Sandoz agree. He could not see the man, but Carlo could picture the head shaking in wonder, silver hair falling over black eyes. "Of all the lives on two planets that I might have chosen to save," Sandoz told him, "yours, Don Carlo, would have been at the very bottom of my list. How do you feel?"

"Inglorious but better, thank you." Carlo tried to smile and was startled by how odd his swollen face felt. I must look like Frans, he thought as his vision cleared and breathing became easier. Then it struck him: "Your dream, Sandoz! You said I wasn’t in the city of the dead—"

"Yes, and I am afraid you won’t be going to the city of Gayjur either," said Sandoz dryly. "I’m sending you back to the Bruno. Danny is going along as medic, in case you crash again. John will pilot—"

"Sandoz, I didn’t come all this way—"

"To die of anaphylaxis," Emilio finished for him, "which is exactly what you did a short while ago. Yasapa blooms year-round. You can try the surface again later, if you like—maybe John can reconfigure a pressure suit for you. For now, I recommend that you return to the mother ship. The decision is yours, of course."

"Right," said Carlo, not one to argue with facts for very long. "Radio the change of plans to Signora Mendes and put Frans on remote as backup pilot. Do you suppose yasapa brandy would affect people as the blossom did me?" he asked. "We’ll have to put warning labels on anything we export— drink at your own risk. That will probably increase the appeal! An element of danger—"

"You’ll still get sued, ace," Danny told him. "I’m going to move you to the cockpit. We need to reopen the cargo bay, but you should be okay if you’re sealed off, up front. As soon as we get the gear unloaded, you’re going back to the Bruno."

NOT FAR TO THE NORTHWEST, IN THE SHADOW OF A LIMESTONE ESCARPMENT, a small mixed party of awestruck travelers listened for the second time to a shrieking roar that reached them from the darkening flatlands. This time the wedge-shaped mechanical object rose slowly into their sightline on gouts of flame, its blackened carapace absorbing the dying light of the second sun. They watched, mute, as the lander reached an altitude that allowed for straightforward propulsion and readjusted the attitude of its engine bells, shooting forward and upward, then banking and climbing. Soon there was no sound but the slap of the water against the hull of their boat as they stared at the rapidly dwindling sight.

"Sti’s feet dancing," Shetri Laaks swore in the gloom, as a blast of burnt fuel reached them. "What a stench! Those people must be dead in the nose."

"Why did they go back so soon?" Kajpin wondered. "I thought their plans were to wait here for the escort from Gayjur."

"Now what shall we do?" Tiyat asked. "Go back to—"

"Quiet!" Rukuei whispered, ears cocked toward the landing site. "Listen!" At first there was only the usual tumult of the prairie reasserting itself, now that the reek and noise of the foreign machine was gone: the stridulation and whining buzz of the grasslands once again undisturbed. "There! Hear it?" Rukuei asked. "They haven’t all gone!"

"They sing!" Tiyat whispered. "Isaac will be pleased."

"Sipaj, Kajpin, tie off," Shetri said urgently. "We’re upwind! Rukuei, can they taste scent at all?"

"Not so well as we, but they’re not oblivious. Perhaps we should circle around to get downwind of them." He couldn’t see a thing anymore. "Or wait until morning."

There was a splash and a rocking shudder as Kajpin began pulling the shallow-drafted boat onto the sloping east bank, not waiting for anyone else’s opinion. "The water’s warm down here!" Tiyat exclaimed when she hopped out to help Kajpin haul the boat close enough to a marhlar stump to make it fast.

"You two monitor the radio," Kajpin told Rukuei and Shetri. "We’ll go up and see what we can find out."

A few scrambling moments later, they heard Tiyat call quietly, "There are three of them!"

"Go sit in the boat!" Kajpin sneered good-humoredly, lying on her belly next to Tiyat. "There’re four! See? There’s a child sitting by that shelter."

"A translator?" Shetri speculated, face turned up toward their voices.

"No, they don’t bring children to learn to be interpreters," Rukuei informed the others. "At least, they didn’t last time. Some of their adults are small." He turned his attention to the radio monitor, but was distracted when a few notes of song reached him. "That’s the one for Isaac. Can you see who’s singing?"

Another small dispute broke out. "Sipaj, Kajpin, did your grandmother screw djanada? You’re the one who’s blind!" Tiyat teased. "It’s the one doing the cooking. Watch the mouths! The others are just jabbering. The cook—do you see? His mouth stays open longer, while the song comes out." There was the sound of sliding as the Runa skidded down the bank, still arguing. Rukuei, listening to the radio, motioned for silence.

"One of their party got sick, so they took him back up," he reported, when the transmission ended. "The others are still waiting for an escort to Gayjur."

"So. There are three adults and one child—or whatever that little one is," Kajpin said, brushing debris from her knees and climbing back into the boat. "There’s black rain east of here, but the VaGayjuri could show up any time, once the weather clears. I say we wait for the foreigners to fall asleep tonight, take the singer for Isaac, and go home."

"The others will wake up!" Tiyat objected. "Isaac can see at night, you know. They’re not like djanada."

"Then grab all four! They don’t look like much for a fight—"

"No," Rukuei said firmly. "Ha’anala was right—you don’t make allies by sneaking up and grabbing people."

"Just invite them to breakfast!" Shetri insisted again. "Sipaj, foreigners, such a long journey you’ve had!" he whispered in a piping Runa falsetto that made Tiyat smother a laugh. "Won’t you join us?" This had been Shetri’s plan from the start, and he was convinced it would work. "Roast some betrin root—Isaac likes betrin," he’d argued back in the valley. "Mix a few grains of othrat into the seasoning, and they’ll sleep all the way to the N’Jarr!"

"Listen to that song," Rukuei breathed. The wind was shifting as the smallest sun dropped below the horizon, and "Che gelida manina" floated toward them on the breeze. "Sipaj, Tiyat, what do you think?" Rukuei asked. "Any ideas?"

"I say wait until morning, so you can see them, too," Tiyat declared. "Two kinds of mind are better than one for making plans."

Which was true, but nothing went as planned.

"SIGNORA," CARLO INSISTED THREE DAYS LATER, "I ASSURE YOU, THEY are at the rendezvous coordinates you gave us—"

"They’re not there," Sofia repeated, cutting Carlo off. Her voice was clear and hard, despite the huge storm system over Gayjur, which made her transmission pop and hiss. "The escort reports they have located the site. Signor Giuliani, my people say that the camp smells strongly of blood, but there are no bodies."

"Oh, my God," John Candotti whispered, hugging himself and pacing along the bridge bulkhead. "I knew we should have gone back down!"

"Let’s not panic, ace," said Danny, but like everyone else, he was reconsidering the facts. Three days of terrible weather, with short reports from the ground crew: "We’re fine." But no details…

"Signora, our entire party has subcutaneous GPS implants," Carlo said, having taken this step to avoid the fate of the lost Contact Consortium party. He watched as Frans Vanderhelst brought up the readouts from the global positioning system. "We are checking the position data as I speak, but there is no reason to believe—"

"What the hell…?" Frans said.

Carlo swore briefly. "Signora, we show three GPS transmitters at the coordinates of the rendezvous. But the implants haven’t moved for sixty-eight hours—. That doesn’t make sense. We heard from the ground party last night. Wait. There is a fourth trace showing a position approximately two hundred and forty kilometers northeast of the landing site."

"Whose trace is still active?" Sofia asked tightly.

"That’s Sandoz," Frans reported.

There was a moan from John and something near a growl from Sofia Mendes. Carlo cut in, still studying the GPS data. "Yes. Definitely. Sandoz started moving north almost three days ago."

"He’s been taken hostage. The others are dead—or worse!"

"Signora! Please! They—"

"Why didn’t you cross-reference the GPS locale with the origin of the radio transmissions?" Sofia demanded. "You should have realized days ago that something was wrong!"

"Never occurred to me," Frans said defensively. He was already pulling up the transcripts to see if there was something he missed, some clue… "Everyone sounded fine!"

"Signora, please! You are assuming your conclusions," Carlo cried. He was hardly one to dither, but Mendes seemed to leap out ahead of everything that was said. "The ground party checked in last night!"

"Have you spoken to all four of them?"

"Yes, at one time or another."

"Then obviously they have been reporting under duress," Sofia snapped, furiously impatient with their slowness. "The GPS implants have been ripped out—"

"Signora, how would anyone know—"

"— which is why there’s been no movement for three days. Someone has managed to take Sandoz’s with them and they’re—"

"One of my men is still down there," Carlo said, trying to slow her down. "Nico has orders to protect Sandoz in particular. If Sandoz were in danger, Nico would have told me."

"There was blood at the campsite," Sofia reminded him. "Signor Giuliani, they’ve been taken hostage. There are renegades in the northern mountains. We’ve never been able to root them out, but now—. This ends," she said almost to herself, her anger like the thunderheads in Gayjur’s sky, whose lightning made the radio crackle and spit. "This ends. The raiding, the theft, the lies. The kidnapping, the murders—it all ends now. I will get our people back and, by God, I will put a stop to this. Signor Giuliani, I am going north with troops to intercept them. I’ll want a continuous monitor of your GPS trace and all radio contacts with the ground party, is that understood? We are going to track those djanada bastards to their lair and finish this, once and for all."

EMILIO SANDOZ WAS THE FIRST TO NOTICE THE TRAVELERS APPROACHING the campsite on foot from the west. All four VaRakhati wore the robes and boots of urban Runa traders, and he had no reason to doubt their identity. "Visitors," he announced, and walked out to meet the newcomers, Nico at his side, Sean and Joseba behind him. He was not afraid. Sofia had assured him repeatedly that there were no djanada south of the Gamu mountains, and Nico was armed.

He held out both his hands, palms upward in the Runa manner, and readied himself for the once-familiar warmth of the long Runa fingers that would rest in his own, then remembered the braces and lowered his arms. "Someone’s hands are not fit for touch, but someone greets you with goodwill," he explained. Glancing at Nico, he urged, "Say hello," and watched, pleased, as Nice’s grave and correct greeting—"Challalla khaeri" — was acknowledged and returned by the two Runa who came forward.

Turning to Sean and Joseba, he smiled at their dumbstruck immobility. "The two in front are women," Emilio told them. "The ones hanging back may be males. Sometimes they prefer to let the ladies do the honors. Say hello." When the greetings had been exchanged, he continued as though he had never been away, "Such a long journey you have had! We would be pleased to share our meal with you."

He saw the two people in the back look at each other, and it was then that he stopped breathing, and stared at the smaller of them. Not a Runao, but someone Emilio Sandoz had seen in all too many nightmares: a man of medium stature, with violet eyes of surpassing beauty that met and held his own with a gaze so direct and searching that it took all his strength to stare back, and give no ground.

It can’t be, he thought. This cannot be the same man.

"You are-you must be the son of Emilio Sandoz?" he heard the man ask. The voice was different. Resonant, and beautiful, but different. "I’ve seen your father’s image. In the records…"

At the sound of the K’San language and the sight of the Jana’ata’s carnassial teeth, revealed as Rukuei had spoken, Sean backed away. Nico drew his weapon, but Joseba stepped up swiftly and said, "Give it to me." He flicked off the safety and with a Basque hunter’s reactions, turned and fired at something snuffling piglike in the bushes nearby.

The gunshot and death squeal set off an explosion of reaction among the wildlife, and the VaRakhati staggered back, eyes wide and ears clamped shut. Joseba handed the pistol back to Nico, who trained it on the Jana’ata who’d spoken, but kept an eye on all of them—now frozen and visibly frightened. Walking to the carcass in the ensuing silence, Joseba bent and lifted the body by one leg, letting its blood drip educationally. "We have no ill will toward you," he said firmly. "Neither will we permit you to harm us."

"Well put," said Emilio. He was breathing hard, but Carlo was right: bullets worked. "I am no one’s father," he said, staring at Rukuei. "Rather, I am the one you have named: Emilio Sandoz. At my word, this man Nico kills anyone who threatens us. Is that understood?"

There were gestures of assent from all four VaRakhati. Dazed, Rukuei said vaguely, "My father knew you…"

"In a manner of speaking," Sandoz said coldly. "How are you to be addressed?" he demanded in High K’San, assuming the belligerent tone of a ranking aristocrat. "Are you first-born or second?"

The Jana’ata’s ears folded back slightly and there was an embarrassed shuffling among the others as he said, "I am freeborn. My mother was not a woman of standing. If you please: Rukuei Kitheri."

"Christ Almighty," Sean Fein gasped. "Kitheri?"

"You are son to Hlavin Kitheri?" Sandoz asked, but there was no doubt in his mind. The stamp of the father was clear, and the son’s chin lifted in confirmation. "You lie. Or you are a bastard," Sandoz snapped. The challenge was deliberate—a testing of response, a probing for flashpoint, knowing that Nico was at his side. "That Kitheri was Reshtar, and had no right to breed."

Too stunned by the actuality of the encounter to react as he might have otherwise, Rukuei merely dropped his tail, but then the fourth person came forward and revealed himself to be Jana’ata as well.

"I am Shetri Laaks." With the instructively dead froyil still dripping blood in one foreigner’s grip, Shetri kept his voice mild, but nevertheless used the dominant pronoun to invite dispute, if the foreigners were inclined to offer combat. "Rukuei is my wife’s cousin and I must not tolerate offense to my affinal kin. He has not lied, nor is he a bastard, but the song of his birth would take long to sing. I believe our purposes will be better served if none of us indulges in further insult."

There was an uneasy silence as both parties waited for Sandoz to respond. "I grant parity," he said finally, and the tension relaxed fractionally. "You speak of purpose," he said, addressing Shetri.

But it was Rukuei who answered him. "I know why you came here," he said, and noted the reaction: a quickening of breath, an intentness. "You came to learn our songs."

"This is true," the small foreigner allowed. "Rather, it was once true." He stopped and drew himself up, throwing his head back to glare at them from a distance with small eyes, black and alien — not like Isaac’s, which were small but blue as normal eyes should be, and which had never stared like this. "We came because we believed you sang of truth, and of the Mind behind truth. We wished to learn what beauties this True Mind had revealed to you. But you sang of nothing beautiful," he said with insulting softness. "Your songs were of the pleasure to be found in unmerciful power, the satisfaction of crushing opposition, the enjoyment of irresistible force."

"Everything is changed from those days," a Runao said. "This one is Kaj — pin," she told them, raising both hands to her forehead. "Now it is the southern Runa who enjoy such power. We VaN’Jarri are different."

"We have one among us who has learned the music you sought—" Rukuei started.

"If you want to hear it, you’ll have to come with us," Tiyat added quickly. "Isaac wishes you to—"

There was a small convulsion among the humans. "Isaac," Sandoz repeated. "Isaac is a foreign name. Is the person you speak of one of us?"

"Yes," said Shetri. "He is of your species, but he is not like his mother, nor like his sister—"

"His sister!" Sandoz cried.

"His sister, my wife, whose name is Ha’anala and whose foster mother was Sofia Mendes u Ku’in," Shetri continued, despite the uproar this provoked.

"You knew my cousin’s sire," Rukuei said then, hoping to reassure Sandoz and the other foreigners, who were clearly upset. "Ha’anala is the daughter of my father’s sister and of Supaari whose landname was VaGayjur—"

"This whole thing stinks to high heaven," Sean was muttering. "Why didn’t Isaac come here with you then?" he demanded in K’San. "Why hasn’t he contacted his mother? Does he live still, or do you merely use his name?"

Not waiting for the answer, Joseba said in English, "What if they’re holding him hostage? Sandoz, what if they’re using him—"

"Hostage!" Kajpin cried, startling them with her knowledge of English. "That’s Athaansi’s game!"

"We do not hold hostages," Rukuei began.

"Nico," Sandoz said quietly, "take that man down."

Before anyone else could move, Rukuei Kitheri had been slammed to the ground and was choking wide-eyed on the gun that Nico had jammed into his mouth with professional efficiency.

"Hear me, Kitheri: if you are tired of life, lie to me now," Sandoz suggested, dropping to his knees to whisper his threat. "How many are there in your party today? Nico, let him talk."

"Four," Rukuei said, the taste of steel in his mouth. "Truly. Only those you see."

"If there are more, I will have you and them killed—you last. Do you believe me?" Rukuei lifted his chin, the gorgeous eyes wide with a satisfying fear. "I say you hold the foreigner Isaac against his will. I say you use him as your father used me."

"These people are crazy!" Tiyat cried above him.

Without taking his eyes off Rukuei, Sandoz shouted, "I will hear this man’s words! Speak, Kitheri: is the foreigner Isaac alive?"

"Yes! Isaac is a person of honor among the VaN’Jarri," said Rukuei, swallowing uselessly, dry-mouthed and confused. "He left the southern Runa many years ago of his own volition. He is free to go or stay. He chooses to stay among us. He likes our songs—"

"Sipaj, Sandoz, we could have taken you hostage last night as you slept!" Kajpin pointed out, too exasperated by this inexplicable hostility to sway. "It was Rukuei’s idea to be honest with you! The escort from Gayjur will be here soon—"

"How do you know that?" Sean demanded, but Kajpin went on, "It is we-but-not-you who are in danger! We are no threat to you. We need you, and we have something to offer in return, but if we’re captured, we’ll be executed!"

Emboldened by the small foreigner’s stillness, Shetri knelt at Sandoz’s side, and spoke with quiet urgency. "The last three times the VaN’Jarri tried to make contact with the government in Gayjur, our delegates were killed on sight. Please. Listen to me. We wish an agreement with the southerners, but the VaGayjuri will not negotiate with us because my nephew Athaansi keeps raiding Runa villages, and we are all held responsible!" He stopped, and calmed himself. "Hear me, Sandoz. I will stand surety. If we lie, if we deceive you in any way, then have me killed as that froyil was killed. I will be your hostage."

"We as well," Kajpin said, standing with Tiyat.

"I also offer you my neck," said Rukuei Kitheri, from the ground. "But you will have to go to Isaac, for he will not come to you. We can take you to him, but you have to trust us. Some of us believe that Isaac has learned the music of the True Mind, which you sought, but he will not come to you to teach it."

"Lies," Sandoz said at last. "You say what we wish to hear—"

"How could we know what you wish to hear?" Tiyat cried.

With a sudden short gasp, Sandoz staggered to his feet and walked a few paces away, his back to them all. "Let him up, Nico," he snapped, but did not turn, unable to sustain the pose any longer. He felt sick, and he needed time to think. "Watch them," he flung back over his shoulder, and strode away.

IT WAS HARD TO SAY WHICH GROUP WAS MORE RELIEVED TO SEE SANDOZ go, but with his intimidating presence removed from their midst, there was a distinct lessening of strain all around.

"It would be a shame to let that froyil go to waste," Shetri commented to Joseba Urizarbarrena once Sandoz was out of hearing, and the hunter in Joseba agreed. So a fire was prepared, and the froyil gutted and hung on a spit, and other provisions brought from the boat by Tiyat, under guard. As meat and vegetables roasted, Sean and Joseba and even Nico questioned hard, and listened hard, and considered at some length what they had been told: whether it was accurate, and what it might imply. In the end, they went to Sandoz.

He was a few hundred meters away, sitting hunched and haggard on the ground. "Nico, why aren’t you watching them, as you were told?" he demanded, hiding behind as much severity as he could still muster.

"They don’t want to run away. They’re waiting for us to go with them," Nico said mildly. "Don Emilio, I had a thought: if we find out where Isaac lives, Signora Sofia will be pleased." The pistol was still in his hand and he kept an eye on his charges, just in case. "Don Carlo will know where we are," he said, glancing at the small lump on his forearm where the GPS transmitter capsule was lodged. "We have guns, and they don’t."

"We’re not going anywhere with them. We’re waiting here for Sofia’s escort," Sandoz said, not moving from the ground.

Joseba looked at Sean and then said, "Nico, would you please get Don Emilio some water? Perhaps a little something very plain to eat?" Nico nodded and trudged off toward the camp as Joseba sat down across from Emilio. "Sandoz, do you have any idea what the population of the Jana’ata was, when you were here before?" he asked.

Sandoz shrugged, eyes dull, not really caring that it was starting to rain again. "No. I don’t know. Except that it was about three or four percent of the prey population. Maybe six hundred thousand? That’s just guess." He looked at Joseba. "Why do you ask?"

Sean and Joseba exchanged glances, and Sean sat down as well. "Listen, Sandoz, the buggers may be lying, but that Rukuei says there’re only about fifteen hundred Jana’ata left now." Sandoz looked up sharply and Sean went on. "The Runa’ve rousted them all off the land. They’re scattered, but there’re two main groups of several hundred apiece, plus some pockets of survivors too scared t’go near anyone else. The VaN’Jarri live in a valley on their own. They’ve got barely three hundred Jana’ata among them, with about six hundred Runa in the same settlement."

Joseba leaned forward. "Carnivores generally need at least two thousand individuals, with two hundred and fifty breeding pairs, just to keep the population genetically healthy. Even if Rukuei is underestimating the total, the Jana’ata are very close to extinction," he whispered, as though to speak aloud of this prediction would make it come true. "If he’s overestimating it, they’re probably doomed." He sat for a while, working it through. "It makes sense, Sandoz. From what we’ve seen and what Shetri says, the Jana’ata must be living at the absolute margins of their ecological range. Even without the collapse of civilization, this species would be on the edge."

"There’s more," Sean said, a little loudly now that the rain had begun in earnest. "There’s something goin’ on up in the north. I had t’ask twice t’be sure of what I was hearin’, but when we asked about them eatin’ that froyil, one of them—that Shetri—told us the VaN’Jarri Jana’ata are near t’starvin’. They won’t eat Runa." Sandoz looked at him, narrow-eyed. "Brace yersalf: the phrase he used was, The meat’s not kosher." Sandoz reared back, and Sean raised a hand. "I swear that’s what he said. Apparently this man Shetri’s wife, Hanala or whatever her name is, was raised by Sofia Mendes in the south, among the Runa."

Joseba said, "Obviously, there has been a certain amount of cultural exchange. Shetri says his wife is a teacher, but Sandoz—the title he used was ’rabbi’. It’s possible that these men are simply lying about not eating Runa, but look at them! They’re thin, their coats are dull, they’re missing teeth—"

"And they’re travelin’ with two fine, fat Runa, who don’t seem a bit concerned about becomin’ anybody’s breakfast." Sean hesitated before going on. "And, Sandoz," he said, "listenin’ t’this Kitheri? Well, it seems to me that Hanala may be a sort of… I don’t know, but I ask myself, What if Moses had been an Egyptian, raised among the Hebrews?"

Sandoz sat open-mouthed, trying to take this in. "You’re serious?" he asked, and when Sean nodded, Sandoz cried, "Oh, for God’s sake!"

"Precisely," Joseba agreed, and watched without moving as Sandoz stood, soaked to the skin.

"You’re hearing what you want to hear!" Sandoz accused. "You’re imposing your own folklore on this culture!"

"Perhaps we are," Joseba agreed, from his seat in the mud, "but I came here as both an ecologist and a priest. I want to know about this. I am going north with them, Sandoz. Sean wants to go, too. You can stay here with Nico and wait for Sofia’s people to arrive. All we ask is that you don’t give them away. We’ll take our chances with them—"

With Nico’s approach, they fell silent and watched as Sandoz drank water from the canteen and got a little food into himself, refusing to discuss this nonsense further.

But Nico, ordinarily the quietest of them, had something on his mind. "Don Emilio, one of those Jana people has a bad dream like yours," he said, wiping his wet hair back out of his eyes. Sandoz stared at him, and Nico continued, "He dreams of a city burning. He told me. It’s from when he was a little boy, he says, but he’s seen you there. In the city. In his dream. I think you should ask him about it."

WHICH IS WHY, AFTER CONSIDERABLE ADDITIONAL INTERROGATION AND discussion, eight people of three species finally went north together in secrecy and foul weather. They did not tell Carlo Giuliani of their decision, concerned that the radio was being monitored by the Gayjur government. Knowing now the danger the VaN’Jarri were in, it was Joseba’s suggestion that they remove their GPS implants—a small cut each, nothing to be concerned about.

They intended to travel as quickly and inconspicuously as they could, but if anyone questioned them, their story would be simple. The foreigners were friends to Fia. Shetri and Rukuei were VaHaptaa mercenaries who were leading these Runa and the foreigners to the last stronghold of the predators who’d preyed on the Runa since time began. When the place was known, the army could come and clean the last of the djanada out, and then they would be gone, forever.

The VaN’Jarri believed that this was all merely a convincing lie. In fact, it was very nearly the precise truth.

Nico d’Angeli had not really understood what Joseba said about minimum breeding population and species collapse, nor had he followed much of the talk of revolution or religion. But Nico understood very well what Frans had told him before landfall. "I can’t find you if you take the GPS implant out, Nico. The people on the Magellan were all lost—no one knows what happened to them, capisce? Never remove this, Nico. As long as you have a transmitter with you, I can find you."

So while the others were loading the boat and making ready to leave, Nico slowly came to the conclusion that it was best for Don Carlo and Frans to know where they were going, even if the others didn’t think so. That was why he retrieved one of the discarded implants and put it in his pocket.

He meant no harm.

THEY WENT BY RIVER AT FIRST, JANA’ATA AND HUMANS CROWDED INTO the cargo hold, their Runa conspirators topside, calling out greetings to sodden barge passengers and crew as their wakes crossed. The powerboat’s batteries were as silent as sail and its passengers almost as quiet, even when there was no one to hear them. One human or another would think of some objection to what he had been told, and would say what was on his mind, and have his doubts assuaged. The VaN’Jarri, too, would venture a question now and then, but the one most eaten by desire to know about the foreigners was also the one most frightened of Sandoz, who had barely spoken since agreeing to go as far as Inbrokar City with them. So Rukuei kept quiet as well.

Not wanting to compromise their safe houses by duplicating their route south, they left the river behind on their second day. Tiyat and Kajpin let the others off near a cave a few cha’ari short of the Tolal bridgehead, and then went on alone, returning the powerboat to the livery, where Tiyat made a show of disputing the damage done to the hull when they’d run the boat aground. Finally Kajpin waved the extra charge off and said expansively, "It’s only money! Pay the woman—we’ll make it up on that rakar deal." Which led to comfortable small talk about the new rakar plantations, and then to amiable farewells, called loudly over the pounding rain as Tiyat and Kajpin moved off toward town.

"It’s only money," Tiyat echoed irritably, as they stopped in the Tolal market district and spent their last few bahli on salt.

"Don’t worry," Kajpin told her when they were out of earshot, heading out of town on a road that went northeast. "We can jump a caravan next season!" When they were sure no one was behind them, they veered overland and doubled back toward the south at a trot.

Reunited at the cave without further incident, the party left roads and rivers behind and traveled instead through an endless rolling landscape. Stopping periodically to listen and watch and stand nose to the wind, the VaN’Jarri became increasingly confident that they’d escaped detection. Indeed, there was little left in this monstrous, lovely, depopulated land that bore the imprint of mortal mind or hand. For hours, walking without haste but without rest, they saw nothing but low-growing clumps of lavender-leaved plants with bell-shaped blooms that nodded on wiry stems, battered by rain as warm as blood, and heard nothing but the drumming of rain and the squelching of footsteps, and the lilt of Nico’s singing.

"You don’t mind?" Sandoz asked the Runa as they walked. "Someone could ask Nico to stop singing."

"I don’t mind," Kajpin said.

"It’s not as beautiful as Isaac’s music," said Tiyat, "but it’s nice."

The foreigners carried communications gear, and answered periodic status calls from the Giordano Bruno with laconic reports that sounded bored.

"It’s rainin’here like the third ring of hell," Sean said once. "What’s the weather look like for tomorrow?"

"Clearing up," Frans told him.

"Thank God for that," was the heartfelt reply. And Sean closed the connection.

THEIR SLEEP WAS BROKEN EARLY NOT BY THUNDER BUT BY THE RADIO transponder’s whistle, clear and musical in the scrubbed morning air. It was Frans Vanderhelst, hailing anyone from the Giordano Bruno. Sean answered, yawning, and heard Frans say, "Is everything okay down there?"

"Shit, yes," Sean answered irritably. He nodded agreement as Joseba, bleary-eyed, leaned over to put the transmission on conference so everyone could listen to both sides of the conversation.

"We’ve lost live traces from three of the four GPS implants. What’s going on?"

That brought them fully awake. They had expected questions about the implants eventually, but not this one. "Three of the four?" Sean looked at his companions and saw the story on Nico’s face, rosy in the cloudless dawn. Joseba moaned and put his head in his hands. The VaN’Jarri roused as well and began to ask questions, but Sandoz hissed a warning as Sean raised a hand for silence.

"We have three GPS signals at the rendezvous showing no movement for three days," Carlo was saying. "There’s another one two hundred and forty kilometers northeast of the site. Are you all right?"

"Yes! We’re fine, dammit, except y’woke us all up! Can we talk later? I was havin’ a very fine dream—"

"So what’s going on with the implants?" John cut in. "Why can’t Sofia’s escort find you guys? They said the campsite smells of blood. For a minute there, we thought you were dead and eaten! We just talked to Sofia and she’s convinced Emilio’s been kidnapped by renegade Jana’ata-she’s ready to come after you with an army! What’s going on?"

Kajpin’s ears folded back at the word "army," and the other VaN’Jarri began to show signs of stress. Sean yawned theatrically, and looked around with large, desperate eyes while sputtering, "Christ! Is that you now, Candotti? One question at a time! We’re fine, I tell you! The blood was—" Sandoz, struggling to get a brace on, glared a warning at him. "Hang on, now. Sandoz wants to speak to you," Sean said, and handed the transceiver to him with some relief.

"John, this is Emilio. Tell Sofia she watched too many old Westerns with me," Sandoz suggested with a very nice imitation of amusement. "We don’t need the U.S. Cavalry riding to the rescue! Wait—have Frans put me through, yes? I’ll talk to her directly."

They all waited, tense and silent, as Sandoz walked a little distance away and stood with his back to them. Even so, they could hear his side of the conversation clearly in the still morning air. "Mendes? No, listen to me! We’re all right—. Oh, God. Don’t cry, Sofia! I’m fine. Truly…. Yes. Everything is fine…. Calm down, okay?" He looked at the others and winced, shaking his head slightly: never tell a woman to calm down. "No, Sofia, listen! That was just a froyil that Joseba shot! Yes—we barbecued it! I decided we should move camp so the blood wouldn’t put the escort off. We’re not far away."

"Relative to Earth," Joseba muttered.

"I don’t know what to tell you about that signal north of the rendezvous site," Emilio said then.

"Not one lie so far," Sean whispered, impressed.

"Maybe the implants are defective?" Sandoz suggested, pacing now. "Or the software’s no good?" A pause. "Well, it doesn’t matter, because we’re fine, okay? Listen, Mendes, we were up kind of late last night and everybody’s pretty tired, so we’d like to get a little more rest before we—. Sure! Yes, have them wait right there for us! That’s perfect!" he cried, standing still, eyes wide with relief. "You, too. Go back to bed—. Then have breakfast!" he said, smiling now. "Are you all right? Sure? Don’t worry about us! We’ll be in touch."

"Christ," Sean breathed as Sandoz returned to their circle and sank to the ground. "Remind me never to play poker with you again."

BACK ON THE SHIP, DANNY SHRUGGED. "D. W. YARBROUGH ALWAYS SAID Sofia Mendes could think too damned quick for her own good."

But Frans Vanderhelst was looking at Carlo. "There’s nothing wrong with those implants."

"Oh, yeah?" said John. "Look at the screen."

The fourth trace had just gone dead.

"I’M SORRY, DON EMILIO," NICO REPEATED AS JOSEBA POUNDED THE GPS transponder to pieces between two rocks. "Frans said—"

"It’s all right, Nico, I understand. You meant well," Emilio muttered, "for all the difference that ever makes."

"The army is coming," Kajpin said. "They think we’ve taken you hostage—"

"And they know where we are right now," Joseba told them.

"But Sandoz bought us some time," Sean pointed out. "They think we’re safe and camped somewhere near the rendezvous site—" Then his face fell further than it normally hung, and he stared balefully at the remains of the GPS implant. "Fack."

Joseba, rock still in hand, went motionless and then closed his eyes, realizing the deception had just been revealed. Only Sandoz had a clue as to what he said for the next few moments, but the burden of his speech was clear even to the VaN’Jarri. "Apologies," he said finally, his face flushed with shame. "I acted in haste."

"Go on without us," Sean urged the VaN’Jarri then. "We’ll go back and meet the escort. It’s us they’re concerned about. Soon as they know we’re all right, they’ll relax. We can figure out how to get to the N’Jarr later—"

"How much farther is it to Inbrokar?" Sandoz asked Rukuei quietly.

"We could be there by second sunrise today, if we move fast."

"It takes time to mobilize troops," Sandoz said. "We’re three days away from the rendezvous site, and it will be farther for them, because they’ll have to come overland the whole way, won’t they?"

"No, they can use troop barges, but that’s slow, too," Kajpin said.

Tiyat began to sway. "They don’t need the troops—there’ll be militia alerted all over the country. We’re cooked."

"I’m sorry," Nico said again. "But—what if we told Signora Sofia that we’ll bring back her son? We tell her, Don’t follow us. If you do, the deal is off. You cooperate, your boy comes back to you, no harm done." He looked around, hopeful that he had redeemed himself.

"It might work," Sandoz said after a time. He started to laugh, but then sobered and lifted his chin thoughtfully, grew somehow heavier and older before their eyes, and when he spoke it was in the hoarse tones of Marlon Brando, resurrected in the Rakhati sunlight. "We make her an offer she can’t refuse."

Joseba looked at Sean, who shrugged, and then put the call through to the Bruno. Emilio took the transceiver and cut off John’s demands to know what the hell just happened to that fourth implant. "Don’t ask, okay? Just don’t ask. I’m going the extra mile, John. I can’t tell you more than that. Have Frans put me through to Sofia."

The others watched while he waited, still grinning, for Sofia’s connection, but the sense of fun died almost immediately. Reluctant to threaten, he began with an appeal to friendship and trust, but met an icy wall of objection.

"You’re right, Sofia," he said. "Absolutely. But we are not under duress—. Listen to me!"

Instead he listened, letting her warn him, plead with him, threaten him, condemn his judgment. "Sofia," he cut in finally, "I have to do this. There is something I have to see for myself. All I’m asking is that you give me some time to work this through-a couple of weeks, maybe. Please. I never asked you for anything before, Sofia. Just this one thing, okay? Give me a chance to see for myself…"

There was no reasoning with her; there never had been. He turned to look at the VaN’Jarri-their faces tight with anxiety, pinched with hunger—and listened to the uncompromising words of a woman he had known long ago.

"Sofia, you leave me no choice," he said finally, hating himself. "I believe I can locate Isaac and bring him back to you, but only on the condition that we are not followed. That’s the deal, Mendes. Back off, and I’ll do what I can to bring your son home to you."

He closed his eyes as he listened to her tell him what she believed he had become. He didn’t argue. Mostly, she was right.

AT MIDDAY THEY CRESTED A LOW RISE THAT GAVE OUT ONTO A FIELD rank with weed, and from that vantage the ruins of Inbrokar could be seen in the milky haze of prairie heat. For a time, Emilio gazed silently at the blackened rubble. It was not the city of his dreams, but the charred gates seemed familiar, and if he closed his eyes, he could almost picture the chiseled stone walls that had once given an illusion of safety.

"Can you smell it?" Rukuei asked him.

"No," Emilio said. "Not yet." Then—a faint sweetness: corruption’s ghost. "Yes. I smell it now," he said, and turned to meet Kitheri’s eyes: beautiful, haunted, and as weary as his own. "Wait here," Sandoz told the others, and walked with Rukuei down the sloping hill onto the battlefield.

"I was twelve," Rukuei said, measuring his stride to the pace of the small person beside him. "The war was as old as I was. Thirty thousand men died here in a single day, and then a city full of refugees. Within another year or two—a civilization."

Weather and the work of scavengers had made dust or dung of all but the densest elements of bone, but of these, there were many. ’Their blood has been shed like water, round about Jerusalem, and there was none to bury them,’ "Sandoz murmured. Here and there, the glint of fragile rusted metal caught the eye as they walked. Bending to examine a helmet, Sandoz saw a single tooth, flat-crowned and broad. "Runa," he remarked, with some surprise. "When did they start wearing armor?"

"Toward the end of the war," Rukuei said.

"I’ve heard it said: Choose your enemies wisely, for you will become them," Sandoz told him, and was moved to apologize for frightening the young man so badly at their first meeting, but fell silent when he saw Rukuei stiffen.

"My father wore silver and gold," the Jana’ata said quietly, walking toward a gleaming scrap of metal. A finely wrought fastener, ripped loose, trampled into the mud, concealed from gleaners for years, weathering out again sometime during the last rainy season. Rukuei bent to pick it up, but stayed his hand when he noticed something white nearby. The tough, compact bone of an opposable toe, perhaps. And there, a fragment of the heavy nuchal crest from the base of a skull. "We—we cremate our dead," Rukuei said, straightening, looking at the ruins now to escape the sight of scrappy remnants lying on the ground. "So, in some ways, it seemed acceptable that so many died in the fires, after the battle."

But this, he thought. This…

The mechanical whirr of the foreigner’s hands brought him back to the present, and Rukuei saw in flesh what had once been merely dream— Emilio Sandoz, on the battlefield of Inbrokar. Stooped over, reaching for the bits of bone and teeth. Carefully picking each small piece up, gathering the remains methodically: Runa and Jana’ata, mingled in death.

Without speaking, Rukuei joined him in this task, and then the others came to help—Kajpin and Tiyat, Sean Fein and Joseba Urizarbarrena, and Shetri Laaks, silently bringing the anonymous dead together. Nico removed his shirt, spreading it out to collect the relics, and soon the quiet was broken by the plaintive melody of "Una furtiva lagrima." As fragmentary as the remains were, there was too much scattered across too broad a field to do right by it all, so when the makeshift shroud was filled, they counted themselves done, and carried what they had gathered to a place inside the ruins, where the smell of weathered char was stronger. They added to it with a smoky pyre built of half-burnt wood pried from what had once been a storage building near the Embassy of Mala Njer.

"What I remember most clearly is my small sister’s voice," Rukuei told them as the fire crackled. "All the Paramount’s freeborn children were in the embassy—he must have known how it would end, but hoped that there would be perhaps some respect for diplomats." Rukuei laughed—a short, hard sound—at his father’s naïveté. "My sister was somewhere in the fire. As we ran from the city, I could hear her call my name. A silver wire of sound: Ru-ku-eiiiii…"

That evening, as the light died, he sang for them a poetry of wounds, of loss and of regret and of yearning; of the concentration and intensification of such hurts with each new injury to the soul; of the slackening and rarefaction of pain and sorrow in the dance of life and in the presence of children. In the midst of this, Shetri Laaks stood and stumbled blindly away, hoping to escape the songs’ pain, but when he came to rest a good distance from the pyre, he heard a foreigner’s footsteps behind him, and knew from the scent that it was Sandoz.

"Tell me," Sandoz said, and his silence was a void that Shetri felt compelled to fill.

"He doesn’t mean to hurt me," Shetri whispered. "How can he know? Rukuei thinks children are hope, but they’re not! They’re terror. A child is a limb that can be torn from you—" Shetri stopped, and tried to slow his breathing, to force it into an even rhythm.

"Tell me," Sandoz said again.

Shetri turned toward the foreigner’s voice. "My wife is pregnant, and I fear for her. The Kitheris are small, and Ha’anala nearly died during the last birth—the baby was large in the hindquarters, like a Laaks. Ha’anala hides a great deal. This pregnancy has been very hard. I fear for her, and for the baby. And for myself," he admitted. "Sandoz, shall I tell you what my daughter Sofi’ala asked me when she learned her mother was pregnant again? She asked, Will this baby die, too? She has lost two younger brothers. She expects babies to die. So do I."

He sat down where he stood, heedless of the mud and ash. "I was once an adept of Sti," said Shetri. "I was third-born, and content. Sometimes I long for the time when there was nothing in my life but still water, and the chants. But six must sing together, and I think the others are all dead now, and there is no one who can be spared to learn the ritual. I once believed myself fortunate to become a father but now—. It is an awful thing to love so much. When my first son died…"

"I am sorry for your losses," Sandoz said, sitting down next to him. "When is the new baby due?"

"In a few days, perhaps. Who can tell with women? Maybe it’s come already. Maybe it’s over." He hesitated. "My first son died of a disease of the lungs." He tapped his chest, so the foreigner understood. "But the second—" He fell silent.

"Tell me," said the foreigner softly.

"The priests of Sti are known—were known for our medicines, our knowledge of how to heal wounds and help the body overcome illness when it was fitting to do so. I could not stand to watch Ha’anala die, so I tried to help her. There are drugs to ease pain…" It was a long while before he could finish. "It was my fault that the child was stillborn," he said at last. "I only wanted to help Ha’anala."

"I, too, watched a child dear to me die. I killed her," Sandoz told him plainly. "It was, I suppose, an accident, but I was responsible."

There was lightning to the east; for a moment Shetri could see the foreigner’s face. "So," Shetri said with a soft grunt of commiseration. "I grant parity."

They listened for a time, waiting for the low rumble of thunder to reach them. When the foreigner spoke again, his voice was soft but clear in the darkness. "Shetri, you risked a great deal to come south. What did you expect us to do? We are but four men, and foreigners! What do you want from us?"

"Help. I don’t know. Just—some new idea, some way to make them listen! We’ve tried everything we can think of, but…. Sandoz, we are no danger to anyone anymore," Shetri cried, too desperate to be ashamed. "We wanted you to see that, to tell them that! We’re not asking them for anything. Just leave us alone! Let us live. And—if we could just move a little farther south, where the cranil and piyanot are, I think we could feed ourselves decently. We’ve learned ways to take wild meat — we can support ourselves without taking any Runa. We could even teach Athaansi’s people, and then they’d stop the raiding! If we could just get someplace warmer — if we could keep the women better fed! The mountains are killing us!"

Nico was singing now: "Un bel dì," the notes lifting on the night breeze.

"Shetri, hear me. The Runa love their children, as you do," Sandoz said. "This war began with the slaughter of Runa infants by Jana’ata militia. How do you answer this?"

"I answer: even so, our children are innocent."

There was a long silence. "All right," Sandoz said at last. "I’ll do what I can. It probably won’t be enough, Shetri, but I’ll try."

"GOOD MORNING, FRANS," EMILIO SAID THE NEXT DAY, AS THOUGH nothing much had occurred since his last transmission. "I’d like to speak to John and Danny, if you don’t mind."

There was a slight delay before John’s voice was heard. "Emilio! Are you safe? Where the hell have you—?"

"Listen, John, about that extra mile I was prepared to walk," Emilio said lightly. "If you and Danny don’t mind coming down here to give my friends and me a lift, I think I’d rather fly."

"Not without an explanation, ace," said Danny Iron Horse.

"Good morning, Danny. I’ll explain in a moment—"

Carlo cut in. "Sandoz, I’ve had quite enough of this. Mendes will give us almost no information and I’m certain she’s lying when she does!"

"Ah, Don Carlo! I trust you slept better than I did last night," Sandoz said, ignoring the sounds of irritation. "I find that I must ask you for the loan of a lander. There’s no money in this venture, I’m afraid, but I can get a very good poet to write an epic about you, if you like. I don’t want the drone. I want the manned lander—with Danny and John—and I want it empty, except for a case of cartridges and Joseba’s hunting rifle."

"What’s the ammunition for?" Danny asked suspiciously.

"First principles, Danny: we intend to feed the hungry. The situation on the ground is not as we expected. If our information is correct, there remain only a few small enclaves of Jana’ata, and some of them are presently starving. Joseba believes the entire species may be on the brink of extinction." He waited for the clamor on the Giordano Bruno to die down. "He and Sean are determined to find the truth, as am I. want Danny and John down here as neutral witnesses. I’m afraid Sean and Joseba and I are not generating much in the way of objectivity anymore."

Frans said, "Sandoz, I’ve got a fix on your transmission site near what looks—"

"You needn’t mention the coordinates, Frans. We may be overheard," Emilio cautioned. "I need an answer, gentlemen. There’s not a lot of time to waste.’’’

"An epic, you say?" Carlo asked, self-mockery plain. "Well, perhaps I can work out something more lucrative later. I’ll send the lander, Sandoz. You can pay me back when we get home."

"Don’t tempt me," Emilio warned him with a small laugh, and they made arrangements for the landing.

HA’ANALA HAD TWO DREAMS THAT NIGHT. HER THIRD CHILD—THE unnamed stillbirth—appeared at the doorway, small and fetal but cheerful, his face full of mischief. "Where have you been?" Ha’anala cried when she saw him. "It’s nearly redlight! You shouldn’t stay out so long!" she scolded affectionately, and the baby answered, "You shouldn’t worry about me!"

She roused briefly, with a sensation of tightness across her belly, but the visit from her dream son was reassuring and she drifted back to the heavy sleep that had characterized this pregnancy. The second dream was also of a dead child but, this time, she relived the last few minutes of Urkinal’s life and awoke with a start, the hiss and rattle of his tiny lungs in her ears.

Suukmel, who had moved in with her while Shetri was gone, came awake in an instant. "Is it time?" she asked quietly in the thin light of dawn.

"No," Ha’anala whispered. "I had a dream." She sat up with a graceless lurch but as carefully as she could, not wanting to wake Sofi’ala, sleeping in the nest beside her. Another gray day, she noted, peering out through cracks in the stonework. There was no sound yet from the other houses. "The children came to visit again last night."

"Someone should tie ribbons on your arms," Suukmel said, smiling at the superstition.

But Ha’anala shuddered, as much from the chill of the sunless morning as from the memory of a small rattling chest. "I wish Shetri hadn’t gone. Was Ma with you when your daughters were bom?"

"Oh, no," Suukmel said, getting to her feet and beginning the morning chores. "Ma would never have come near a birth—very unseemly. The women of my caste were always alone—well, not alone. We had Runa. Men generally had nothing to do with women and birth, apart from providing the impetus for the event. And I can’t say that I’d have welcomed an audience."

"I don’t want an audience, I want company!" Ha’anala shifted her position and rested her back against her husband’s rolled-up sleeping nest. She felt vaguely uneasy, despite the fact that they’d received good news directly from Shetri, via the Bruno. He and the others were well and would be arriving today, with the foreigners, in an extraordinary craft that could bring them home quickly and without detection. "Even if Shetri can’t stand to be here when the baby’s born, I’ll be glad—"

She stopped, face still. At last! she thought, welcoming the wave of cramp, rolling from top to bottom. When she raised her eyes, Suukmel was watching knowingly. "Don’t tell anyone else yet," Ha’anala said, glancing significantly at Sofi’ala, who was beginning to stir. "I want company, not a fierno."

"I’m hungry!" Sofi’ala whined, eyes still closed. It was the inevitable morning greeting, this time of year.

"Your father’s bringing wonderful things to eat," Suukmel told the child gaily, and smiled a little sadly when the child’s glorious lavender eyes snapped open at that news. They could hear other households awakening nearby, and the first wisps of smoke from Runa dung fires were beginning to reach them. "He’ll be here soon, but why don’t you go to Biao-Tol’s hearth and see what’s cooking there?"

"Wait—" Ha’anala called as Sofi’ala ran out to join the other children, who spent their mornings dashing around the village, peering into pots, hunting for the most abundant or tastiest meal available. "Sipaj, Sofi’ala! Don’t be a nuisance!" Suukmel chuckled at that, but Ha’anala insisted, "She is! She is a nuisance! And I hate the way she orders the other children around."

"You see yourself in her," Suukmel told her. "Don’t be hard on the girl. It’s natural for her to try to dominate them."

"It’s also natural to defecate whenever and wherever the urge arises," said Ha’anala in riposte. "That doesn’t make it acceptable behavior."

"But even the Runa children resist her! It’s good training," Suukmel parried. "They all gain strength."

They spent the morning jousting like this, enjoying the mental combat, but the tempo and strength of the contractions were constantly on their minds. "They should be quicker now, and stronger," Ha’anala said, when all three suns were up, the brightest a flat, white disk burning through the cloud cover overhead.

"Soon enough," Suukmel said, but she, too, was concerned, watching with some dismay as Ha’anala curled up in her nest and fell silent.

By that time, Ha’anala’s daughter had worked out what was going on, and Suukmel turned her attention to reassuring the child and greeting the guests who began to gather, alerted by Sofi’ala’s anxious wail. Though the Jana’ata considerately withdrew after conveying their good wishes, the house was soon crowded with Runa, who brought enthusiasm and encouragement and food for the assemblage, along with the warmth of their bodies and of their affection. Like the Runa, Ha’anala believed a birth was an occasion for festivity and seemed happy for the distraction, so Suukmel did not drive the visitors off.

If the contractions did not quicken, they did at least increase in intensity and Ha’anala welcomed that, despite the pain. In the midst of an endless discussion of what might hurry the labor along, a boy ran in with news of the lander and soon they all heard its horrifying noise, the room emptying abruptly as the crowd moved off to witness this astonishing arrival.

"Go on—see what it’s like!" Ha’anala told Suukmel. "Tell me about it when you come back! I’ll be fine, but send Shetri!"

"Orders, orders, orders," Suukmel teased as she left for the landing site at the edge of the valley. "You sound like Sofi’ala!

Alone at last, Ha’anala rested as best she could, surprised by how tired she was so early in this labor. She listened as the roar of the engines abruptly ceased, heard the buzz of conversation indistinct in the distance. Days seemed to pass before Shetri came to her; despite all she wanted to ask him, the only words she spoke aloud were, "Someone is cold."

Shetri went to the door and shouted for help. Soon Ha’anala was lifted to her feet and, though she stopped and squatted now and then, hit by another contraction, she was able to walk slowly to a place where game in miraculous quantity was spitted and roasting over smoky fires. Smiling at the spontaneous carnival that had erupted, her eyes sought out the foreigners in the crowd. One was close in size to Sofia, the others as tall as Isaac, but with none of his wandlike slenderness. Dark and light; bearded and hairless and maned. And the languages! High K’San and peasant Ruanja and H’inglish—as hilariously mixed in the confusion of the cooking and greetings and stories as Ha’anala’s own speech had been when she’d first met Shetri.

"They are so different!" she cried, to no one in particular. "This is wonderful. Wonderful!"

Cheered by warmth and the prospect of rapprochement with the south, Ha’anala knelt heavily, bearing down with a will, certain that this was the moment when the new child should be brought into light and laughter. She felt instead a tearing pain that made her scream and silenced the others, so that only the hiss of fire and the distant warbling of a p’rkra could be heard. When she could breathe again, she laughed a little and assured everyone wryly, "I won’t try that again!"

Slowly the merriment and conversation resumed, but she could smell Shetri’s anxiety and this worried her. "Tell me about your journey!" she commanded affectionately, but he was frightened and made an excuse to help the foreigners distribute meat, sending Rukuei to sit behind her like a Runa husband. Suukmel came as well, and Tiyat, with her youngest riding her back. Content to have her cousin’s arms around her shoulders, Ha’anala leaned back against his belly, his legs drawn up around her own, his cheek resting near hers, and listened as Rukuei sang of his adventure in a spontaneous poem with the rocking rhythm of a steady walk. She was genuinely interested in the story, and drifted along, buoyed by the tale, laughing when Rukuei made comedy out of the fright he had been given by the little foreigner Sandoz.

"Small individuals can be surprisingly powerful," Ha’anala observed breathlessly, leaning over to press her lively belly between her chest and legs, glad that she could summon up a little humor even now.

Hearing his name, Sandoz had joined them, making an obeisance rather than offering his hands..When the introductions were over, he sat where he too could watch the party: silent, hunched and rocking slightly, his arms crossed over his chest. His posture very nearly mimicked her own during a contraction, and Ha’anala’s first words to him were, "Funny, you don’t look pregnant."

He stared and then hooted, startled by the remark but apparently amused. "If I am, we’re definitely going to have to start a new religion," he replied, and if she didn’t understand all of his words, she liked his smile. He had eyes like Sola’s—brown and small—but warm, not stony. "My lady, what language best pleases you?" he asked.

"Ruanja for affection. English for science—"

"And jokes," he observed.

"K’San for politics and poetry," Ha’anala continued, pausing as the wave crested and then receded. "Hebrew for prayer."

For a time, the five of them watched Runa tending fires and roasting sticks of root vegetables now that the Jana’ata had been able to eat their fill. "We have dreamed of this," Suukmel said, smiling at Tiyat and then reaching out to grasp first Rukuei’s ankle and then Ha’anala’s.

"Dreamed of what?" Sandoz asked. "Eating well?"

Suukmel considered him for a time and decided he was being ironic. "Yes," she agreed easily, then swept an arm across the panorama. "But also of this: all of us together."

"Someone’s eyes feel good to see it," said Tiyat. She looked down at her sleeping son, and then at the people surrounding Ha’anala. "Three kinds are better than one!"

"Sandoz, tell me about each of your companions," Ha’anala said, in the language of politics.

He motioned toward the one with the bare skull first and answered her in the language of affection. "Djon has clever hands, like a Runa, and a generous heart. Look now at his face, and you will learn how a human appears when he enjoys something. Someone thinks: to help others is Djon’s greatest pleasure. He has a talent for friendship." He paused, and switched to K’San. "I believe he is incapable of lying."

"The one next to him?" Ha’anala asked, glancing at Suukmel, who was also listening carefully.

The answer was in Hebrew. "He is called Shaan. He sees very clearly, without sentiment." Sandoz paused, looking at the others, and realized that only Ha’anala spoke Hebrew. In K’San he said, "Sometimes it is necessary to hear hard truths. Shaan is fierce, like a Jana’ata, and unsparing. But what he says is important." He gestured then toward Joseba, and simplified the name. "Hozei also sees clearly, but he is subtle. When Hozei speaks, I listen carefully."

"And the black-haired one?" Suukmel asked, when Ha’anala was silenced by another contraction.

Sandoz drew in a chestful of air and let it out slowly. "Dani," he said, and they waited to hear which language he selected. "He may be of use to you," he said in K’San. "He knows from his own people’s experience what the Jana’ata face, and he wants very much to be of aid to you. But he is a man of ideals, and has sometimes chosen them over ethics."

"Which makes him dangerous," Suukmel remarked.

"Yes," Sandoz agreed.

"The one who is singing?" Ha’anala asked. "He, too, is like a Jana’ata, I think. Is he a poet?"

Sandoz smiled and continued in Ruanja. "No, not a poet, but Nico appreciates the work of poets, and his voice graces it." He glanced at Tiyat and chose his words carefully. "Nico is more like a village Runao, who can be led easily by anyone who is forceful." He paused as the three Jana’ata exchanged looks. "Nico can be a danger, but I trust him now. In any case, he won’t stay with you," Sandoz told them. "He is a member of a trading party that will only be here long enough to do business in the south. The others wish to remain here, to be of use and to learn from you, if you will permit it."

"And you, Sandoz?" Rukuei asked. "Will you stay or go?"

He did not answer because Ha’anala closed her eyes, folding over her belly, and this time, gave a strangled cry that brought Shetri to her side. When her breath returned, she said, "It will be well. I am not afraid."

AS THE LIGHT FADED, SO DID THE PAINS, WHICH SEEMED NOW TO BE AT some distance. Her attention flickered like the fire that warmed her and lit up the night, but she continued to listen to the quiet conversation around her, marveling at Sandoz’s voice, so unlike Isaac’s—not loud and halting but soft and musical, its pitch rising and falling, its cadences varied and flowing. Ha’anala had forgotten that humans could speak that way, and she was saddened by the years that had passed since she had last heard Sofia’s voice.

Swept by mourning, she grieved for the past, and also for the future she would not know, for there came a private moment when she knew that she would die—not with the unfocused theoretical understanding that she was mortal but with the physical certainty that death would come for her sooner rather than later. To her surprise, she slept, waking briefly with each gripping muscular wave, aware that she drew on a diminishing reserve of strength each time she rejoined the living. Once she came fully alert in the darkness, and told the others, "When I am gone, take the children to my mother." Soothing murmurs succeeded shocked silence, but she said, "Do as I ask. Remind her of Abraham. For the sake of the ten…" This said, she sank back into oblivion.

At dawn, her husband’s snarl brought her back to the world. She was in the house now but warm, covered with blankets the likes of which she’d never seen. Without moving, she could look out the door to a ghostly landscape softened by fog. "No! I won’t permit it!" Shetri was insisting. "How can you even think of such a thing?"

"Are you giving up then?" she heard a foreigner demand, his harsh accusatory whisper carrying easily in the still dawn air. "You needn’t lose them both, man—"

"Stop!" Shetri cried, turning away from Shaan, ears clamped shut. "I won’t hear of it!"

Closing her eyes, Ha’anala listened to Rukuei explain why she had to die, his words coming to her in scraps and tatters. "There’s no help for it… necessary… prevent generations of suffering in the future… the greater good…"

Ha’anala did not recognize the next voice, but it might have been Hozei who said, "This is not a thing of abnormality but weakness brought on by hunger!"

"Shetri, I think you are right and that Ha’anala will die soon," Sandoz said steadily. "I think Shaan is wrong. The procedure he wishes to try will kill Ha’anala. None of us is an adept—we don’t know how to do this in a way that will preserve the mother’s life, and I think Ha’anala is too weak now to survive it. I am sorry. I am so very sorry. But—among us, when this happens, the child sometimes lives for a very short time after the mother dies. Please—please, if you will permit it, perhaps we can at least save the child."

"How?" Ha’anala called, firm-voiced. "How do you save the child?"

She saw the small foreigner’s outline in the doorway, black against gray, and then he was at her side, kneeling, his hands in their strange machines, resting on his thighs. "Sipaj, Ha’anala, someone thinks that after you are gone, for a few moments, the child will live on, It would be necessary to cut open your body and lift the child out."

"Desecration," Shetri hissed again, standing above them both, tall and stiff backed. "No, no, no! If—. I don’t want the child! Not now, not this way! Ha’anala, please—"

"Save what you can," she said. "Hear me, Shetri. Save what you can!"

But he would not agree and Suukmel was arguing now, and Sofi’ala wailing, and the foreigners—

Suddenly, Ha’anala knew what it was to be Isaac, to have the music within her drowned out by noise. "Get out, Shetri," she said wearily, too far gone to tolerate the fierno another moment, too used up to be kind or tactful. "All of you: leave me alone!"

But she reached out and hooked her claws over Sandoz’s arm, and held him fast. "Not you," she said. "Stay." When the room was empty except for the two of them, she told him slowly, in the language of prayer, "Save what you can."

FOR NINE HOURS MORE, HE DID WHATEVER SHE ASKED OF HIM, TRYING to ease her any way he could. Assured that there was hope for her child, Ha’anala rallied, and Emilio allowed himself to believe that she’d manage on her own. Ashamed of himself for panicking, his greatest concern for a time was how he would ever apologize adequately to Shetri for making this birth so much more frightening than it already was for a terrified father who’d lost two earlier children.

But the labor went on and on. Toward the end, thirst was her main complaint, and he tried to help her drink, but she couldn’t hold anything down. He ducked outside the crude stone hut to ask about ice, but the small glacier that had formed between two peaks near the valley was too far away to be of use. John ran to the lander and got the oldest, softest shirt out of his pack; soaking a section of it in water, twisting it like a nipple, he handed this to Emilio, who offered it to Ha’anala. She sipped at the liquid this way and did not vomit, so for a time, Emilio simply dipped the cloth into water, over and over, until her need abated.

"Someone likes the sound of your voice," Ha’anala told him, eyes closed. "Talk to me."

"About what?"

"Anything. Take me somewhere. Tell me about your home. About the people you left behind."

So he told her about Gina, and Celestina, and they fell silent for a while, first smiling about rowdy little girls, then waiting for another contraction to pass. "Celestina. A beautiful name," Ha’anala said when it was over. "Like music."

"The name is from the word for heaven, but it can also mean a musical instrument, which sounds like a chorus of silver bells—high and chiming," he told her. "Sipaj, Ha’anala, what shall we call this baby?"

"That is for Shetri to say. Tell me about Sofia, when she was young." When he hesitated, she opened her eyes and said, "No, then. Nothing difficult now! Only easy things, until the hard one comes. What did you love when you were a child?"

He was ashamed to have failed her, and Sofia, but found himself describing La Perla and his childhood friends, losing himself in old passions and simple beauties: the solid smack of a ball into a worn glove, the swift arc into second base, a whirling throw to first for a double play. She understood very little but knew the joy of motion, and told him so in short, breathless phrases.

He helped her take more water. "Music, then," she said when she could. "Perhaps your Nico will sing."

Nico did, sitting in shafted light: arias, Neapolitan love songs, hymns he’d learned at the orphanage. Soothed, her thirst slaked, Ha’anala said once more, "Take the children to my mother." She slept; Nico sang on. Tired himself, Emilio dozed off, and awoke to a song that was surely the most beautiful he had ever heard. German, he thought, but he knew only a few of the words. It didn’t matter, he realized, transfixed and at peace. The melody was everything: supple and serene, rising like a soul in flight, obeying some hidden law…

All around them, the VaN’Jarri listened as well, children clinging to parents, everyone aware that the time was very near. Opening his eyes, Emilio Sandoz saw the last fall of the chest, drew back the blankets and studied the abdomen; saw the faint movement and thought, Still alive, still alive. Nico, wide-eyed, handed him the knife.

As though from a great distance, Sandoz watched his own unfeeling hands cut quickly and decisively. For hours, he had feared this moment, afraid that he would cut too deeply or too hesitantly. In the event, there was a kind of wordless grace. He felt purified, stripped of all other purpose as this body opened up beneath him, layer after layer, blossoming, glistening like a red rose at dawn, its petals bathed in dew.

"There," he said softly, and slit the caul. "Nico, lift the baby out."

The big man did as he was told, swarthy face paling in the shadowy hut at the awful sound—sucking and wet—as he pulled the child free. He stood then, thick-fingered hands supporting the infant’s fragile form as though it were made of glass.

John stood just beyond the door, ready to clean the baby and take it to the father, but when he saw what Nico carried, the steam rising wispily from its fine, damp fur, he threw back his head and cried, "Stillborn!" Nico burst into tears, and there was a great howl from the others that fell away when Sandoz lurched like a madman through the doorway and whispered in direct address, in denial and defiance, "God, no. Not this time."

Abruptly he snatched the child away from Nico and dropped to the ground with it, supporting his weight on his knees and his forearms, the tiny body so close he could feel the lingering warmth of its mother’s corpse. With his mouth, he sucked the slimy membrane and fluid from the nostrils and spat, enraged and resolved. Tipping the damp head back with one ruined hand, holding the blunt little muzzle closed with the other, he put his mouth over the nose again: blew gently, and waited; blew gently and waited, over and over. Eventually he felt hands on his shoulders drawing him back, but he wrenched his body from their grip, and went back to the task until John, more roughly now, yanked him away from the little body, and ordered in a voice ragged with weeping, "Stop, Emilio! You can stop now!"

Beaten, he sat back on his heels, and let a single despairing cry into the air. Only then, as the sound torn from his throat joined the high, thin wail of a newborn, did he understand.

The infant’s squall was lost in the eruption of astonishment and joy. Fine Runa hands gathered the baby up and Emilio’s eyes followed the infant as it was cleaned and wrapped, round and round, with homespun cloth, and passed from embrace to embrace. For a long time, he stayed slumped where he was, blood-soaked and spent. Then he pushed himself to his feet and stood, swaying slightly, looking for Shetri Laaks.

He was afraid the father would mourn the wife and curse the child. But Shetri was already holding the little one to his chest, eyes downcast, oblivious to everything but the son he jounced gently in his arms to quiet its crying.

Emilio Sandoz turned away and ducked back into the stone hut, where he was greeted by the wreckage of a woman, as forgotten as he was in the rejoicing. We cremate our dead, Rukuei had said. When? Two days ago? Three? So the Pope was right, Emilio thought numbly. No grave to dig…. Drained of emotion, he sat down heavily, next to what had been Ha’anala. If anything could prove the existence of the soul, he thought, it is the utter emptiness of a corpse.

Unbidden, unlocked for, the stillness came upon him: evoked by music and by death, and by the shadowless love that can only be felt at a birth. Once more, he felt the tidal pull, but this time he swam against it, as a man being swept out to sea fights the current. Putting his head in his hands, he let the weight of his skull press down on the hardware of his braces, for once in his life seeking a physical pain that he could rule, to block out what was beyond his control.

It was a mistake. Tears that sprang from his body’s hurt now began to bleed from his soul’s wounds. For a long time, he was lost, and freshly maimed. It was not his body violated, not his blood spilt, not his love shattered, but he wept for the dead, for the irreversible wrongs, the terrible sorrows. For Ha’anala. For Shetri’s losses, and his own—for Gina and Celestina, and the life they might have had together. For Sofia, for Jimmy. For Marc, and D.W., and Anne and George. For his parents, and his brother. For himself.

When the sobbing quieted, he lay down next to Ha’anala, feeling as empty as her corpse. "God," he whispered, over and over, until exhaustion claimed him. "God."

"SANDOZ? I’M SORRY." DANNY HESITATED, THEN SHOOK HIM AGAIN. "I’M sorry," he repeated when Emilio sat up. "We waited as long as we could, but this is important."

Sandoz looked around, bemused by the sensation of his own swollen eyelids. The confusion lifted quickly. Ha’anala’s body had been removed sometime during the night; the room was packed with priests.

"You okay?" John asked, wincing at the stupidity of the question when Emilio shrugged noncommittally. "Look, there’s something you have to see," John said, and he handed over his own tablet. Frans Vanderhelst had shot a set of data files to his root directory, leaving them for John to discover. A case of divided loyalties, John had decided, looking at the images with growing fear, and working out what they meant. Frans had evidently been watching the show for some time, trying to decide what, if anything, to do about it. A good mercenary has just so much latitude and Carlo was the padrone, but ultimately the fat man had done what he could…

"Jesus," Emilio breathed, scrolling through the images. "Do you have an estimate of the size of that force?"

"I make it something over thirty thousand in the main body," Joseba told him. Any picture in Joseba’s mind of the stately, deliberative life of the Runa had been swept away by the time-date stamps on the images, as he confronted the reality of an army that had conquered the known world of Rakhat as quickly, and more thoroughly, than Alexander had conquered his.

"This looks like light infantry in the vanguard," Danny said, reaching over Sandoz’s shoulder to point at the screen, "backed by armor, maybe two day’s march behind them. And that’s an image from about four days ago. Can you see how much brighter it looks? We’re picking up the glare off the metal."

"There’s infrared showing another large group behind them," Joseba said. "Look at the next one."

Sandoz stared at the image and then looked up at worried faces.

"Artillery," Sean confirmed, "and they’re headed right for us."

"But we came in above the cloud cover, and John stayed below the sound barrier!" Emilio said. "How could they have tracked us?"

It was Danny who answered. "Can’t say for sure, ace, but I could give it a guess."

Emilio thought, and then closed his eyes for a moment. "Carlo sold us out. He gave them the coordinates."

"Looks that way."

Nico stood just outside the door. "So the signora doesn’t have to wait for us to bring Isaac to her," he said. "She’s coming to get him."

"She doesn’t need an army t’do that," Sean pointed out sourly, hunkering down next to Joseba.

"Sandoz, there’s something else you should know," said Danny Iron Horse. "When you three first went missing, Sofia Mendes swore she would ’track those djanada bastards to their lair and finish this, once and for all.’»

"Yes. You can see the appeal," said Sandoz. A lasting peace, secure borders, an unblighted future for the Runa…. He rubbed his face against his arms, and they all got to their feet. For an instant—in a small stone room, surrounded by huge bodies—he felt reality shift, but pulled himself back to the present, which was bad enough. "We have to warn the VaN’Jarri;" he said. "They should probably evacuate. Pull back to that Athaansi’s settlement, yes? Concentrate in one valley and set up a defense?"

Danny shook his head. "Fish in a barrel, once the artillery gets here."

"Small, scattered groups might have a better chance of escaping detection," said Joseba, "but they may also starve to death, or die of exposure."

"Six of one, half a dozen of the other," John said. "Either way, they’re in a real bad place."

"It’s not our decision, now, is it?" said Sean. "We give ’em the facts and let the VaN’Jarri make the move." And when the others shrugged their agreement, he moved to the doorway, jerking his head at Joseba. "Come on, lad. Let us go forth and spread the good news."

"I wonder what Carlo got for us?" John mused as Sean and Joseba stepped past Nico and strode off.

"An excuse to quit before he failed," said Emilio, working through the images Frans had sent. "Look at this one. They’re taking on cargo. Carlo’s going to load up and go home. The drone has been down to Agardi, what? Three times already." He stopped, and then said, "Oh, my God."

"What?" John asked, frightened now. "What’s in Agardi? Munitions factories? Is he—"

"No. Nothing like that. Distilleries," said Sandoz softly, looking up at Danny and John.

"Distilleries?" John echoed, confused. "Then he’s loading—"

"Yasapa brandy," said Danny. Sandoz nodded, and Danny sighed, shaking his head.

"So that’s it, then?" John cried, throwing his hands in the air. "Carlo sells us out, stocks up on Rakhati brandy and goes home richer than Gates!" Furious, he slumped down the wall opposite the door and sat, legs out straight, back against the stones.

"And yet," Emilio remarked mildly, "there does seem to be some justice in the universe after all." He was standing in the doorway, and the light behind him lit up his hair, obscuring his expression. "You see," Emilio said, "I never had a chance to tell Carlo, but yasapa brandy is—"

Danny’s eyes widened. Mouth open, he paused, barely breathing. "Awful?" he suggested hopefully.

"Say yes," John urged, scrambling to his feet and moving to Danny’s side. "Please, Emilio, say it’s awful! Lie if you have to, but tell me it’s the worst liquor you ever drank in your whole life."

Face haggard, eyes seraphic, Sandoz spoke. "It tastes," he said, "just… like… soap."

HAD ANYONE ASKED, EMILIO SANDOZ COULD HAVE EXPLAINED THE KIND of half-hysterical laughter that can overcome grief and fear and desperation, but no one was listening to the Jesuits in Ha’anala’s hut. By the time Emilio went outside, the evacuation of the N’Jarr valley was under way— parents gathering children, bundling possessions, arguing and shouting, making snap decisions, having second thoughts, trying not to panic. There was an island of calm in the midst of all this, and he pushed toward it, knowing somehow that Suukmel Chirot u Vaadai would be at its center, where Ha’anala’s pyre was still smoking.

He dropped to his knees at her side. "We have brought trouble on you," he said. "I am sorry for it."

"You meant well," she said. "And there is a life because of you."

"You’re not packing," he observed.

"As you see," she said serenely, ignoring the tumult around them.

"My lady Suukmel, hear me: you are not safe here anymore."

"Safety, I find, is a relative term." She lifted her hand, as though to draw a veil over her head, but stopped, midgesture. "I am staying," she said in a tone that invited no argument. "I have decided that if this foreigner Sofia comes to the N’Jarr, I shall have a talk with her. We have some things in common." Her lips curled slightly, and her eyes seemed to him amused. "And what are your plans?" she asked.

"Much like your own," he told her. "I’m going south, to have a talk with Sofia."