Killashandra - Crystal Singer

KILLASHANDRA came in from the Milekey Mountains with a load of rose quartz prisms and cylinders in A-sharp or higher. She worked well in the upper registers, which gave her a distinct advantage over most of the crystal singers in the Heptite Guild.

When she’d hit the frequencies, holding the tone long enough to locate and pitch the crystal cutter, she hadn’t thought twice before she’d decided shape: prisms and cylinders. A good crystal singer has to have, first of all, perfect pitch and then a fine intuition for shape. No sense coming in with black quartz in octagons and cubes when the critical demand was for beads and cones.

When Guildmaster Lanzecki told her she’d hit the market at the top, she shrugged.

“Made it lucky this time,” she said, wincing as she remembered the last week on the Range. The sun had been fierce on the scars of her cuttings, half-blinding her, and the scream of crystal had sliced through her mind as she’d cut. But she’d been desperate to hack enough cargo to get off-world for awhile away from crystal song, far away, so her mind would have a chance to heal. “What’s the guild’s percentage of it?”

Lanzecki peered up at her from his console, a little smirk bending the left corner of his thin mouth.

“Don’t quibble, Killashandra.”

She bridled, knowing what he meant. “I’m one of the best and you know it. I’ve got years to go.” Her tithe to the guild would keep her when crystal had blown her mind and stopped her ears.

Lanzecki lifted one shoulder. “You’ve cut crystal a long time, Killashandra.”

“I don’t need reminders,” she said, snapping the words out. And that was a fallacy for crystal singing sapped your memory. “How much is guild cut? I have to have enough to get off-world this time.”

Lanzecki inclined his head slightly for the wisdom of that. “Yes, you’ve soloed too long. That’s not smart, ‘specially in the Milekeys. Find yourself a new partner off-world.”

Killashandra laughed. “That’s what you always say.”

Lanzecki waggled a finger at her. “I mean it. You’ve been too damned lucky but I wouldn’t cut my margins again so fine if I were you, not at your age, and not cutting solo.”

She couldn’t think what he meant. She’d always had a second sense for storms in the Milekeys and always got out well in advance.

“You missed a big one by two hours and that is close,” Lanzecki told her.

“Close but I can still scramble. How many machs did it reach?” she asked with a good show of indifference, considering the cold fear in her belly. She couldn’t remember storm-sign.

Lanzecki tapped out the proper sequence and the slides on the back wall altered swiftly until the Milekey Range and a weatherscope were superimposed. The disturbance had reached the frightening velocity of twelve, mach forces that would have blown her mind had she been caught among crystal.

“There’ll be good cutting when I go back,” she said with an arrogant smile. No one else could cut rose quartz true in the Milekeys.

“Just don’t go back solo, Killa.” Lanzecki was completely serious. “You’ve sung crystals a long time now. You pulled out with a crazy two-hour margin but one day you’ll stay just that moment too long and poof...” He threw his hands up, fingers wide. “Burst ears and scrambled brains.”

“That’s the time, my friend,” and Killashandra patted the console on which he had just recorded her tithe, “I get some of my own back.”

Lanzecki eyed her. “With your ears ruptured and your mind rocking? Sure, Killa. Sure. Look, there’re half a dozen good men’d double you anytime you raised your finger. A good duet makes more than a solo. Larsdahl...”

“Larsdahl?” Killashandra was scornful and suspicious.

“You two worked damned well together.”

“Lanzecki, how much did he slip you to remind me of him?”

Lanzecki’s thin face became absolutely expressionless. When he spoke again, his voice was hard, as if he regretted his impulse.

“I was wrong, Killashandra. It’s too late for you to cut duo. Crystal’s in your soul.” He turned away.

She waited a moment, trying to be amused by his accusation. As if she’d ever sing duet with Larsdahl again. Then she wondered why. There must have been a good reason once if Lanzecki said they’d worked well together once. He’d know. But the prohibition against Larsdahl must have been severe for it to stay so firmly in her mind, even if she couldn’t remember the details.

She decided to clean up and outfit in her guild room. She must have something wearable left from her last trip in. Not that she could remember that time particularly well. That was one problem with being a crystal singer: The sonics did something to your recall circuits. Well, that was one excuse. Actually, unless you went off-world completely, and got away from crystal, nothing memorable ever happened.

Maybe she should double again. “Crystal in her soul, indeed!” Why had she split with Larsdahl? Why had he prejudiced her against any desire to share anything? And he’d had the nerve, the gall, the double-juice to ask about her? She snorted, wondering if he still sang slightly sharp. It’d been the devil to compensate when they cut minor notes.

She felt exhausted as she thumbed the lock on the door to her room and her body still pulsed with the frequencies of the Milekey lodes. She punched for a radiant bath, stripping as she heard the viscous liquid plunging into the tub-tank. Once immersed in that, the fatigue—and the resonances—would drain from her body and she could think beyond the next note.

By then, she did remember patches of her last break. They didn’t please her. For one thing, she’d come in with a light load, forced off the Range a few kilos ahead of a bad storm. She’d reaped the benefits of that storm this trip, of course; that was the way of it with crystals. But she hadn’t had enough credit to get off planet. (If a singer worked one lode a long while, those crystals had the power to call and resonate you no matter where you were on Ballybran until you had to go back to them.) She’d been tired, and lonely and sought company in a landsman; tone-deaf, sober-sided so she couldn’t circe him. But he hadn’t been man enough to anneal her. “Crystal in my soul, indeed!” Lanzecki’s words stung, like crystal scratch.

She made a noise of sheer self-disgust and pulled herself from the tank. The radiant fluid sheeted from her body, as firm and graceful as a youngster’s. Killashandra puzzled idly on the matter of personal chronology. She couldn’t remember her approximate age; it usually never mattered to a crystal singer. Something about the sonics, the crystal songs, stimulated the regenerative RNA and a crystal singer looked and felt young for far longer periods of time than other mortals. Not immortality, but close to it. The price was the risk of numb ears and scrambled brains, high enough.

“This time I’ll be off-planet,” she told her reflection and slid open the dresser panel.

She was mildly surprised at the finery there and decided she must have spent what credit she’d had for pretty threads to lure that unwary landsman. He’d been a brute of a lover, though a change. Anything had been a change from the possessiveness of Larsdahl. How dare he inquire after her? There was no harmony between them any more. He had no lien or hold on her because they’d been a duet!

Angrily Killashandra punched for Port Authority and inquired the destinations of imminent blast-offs.

“Not much, C. S. Killashandra,” she was told politely. “A small freighter is loading for the Armagh system. ...”

“Have I been there?”

Pause. “No, ma’am.”

“What does Armagh do for itself?”

“Exports fish oils and glue,” was the semi-disgusted reply.

“Water world?”

“Not total. Has the usual balance of land and ocean. ...”

“Tropical?”

“It has a very pleasant tropical zone. All water sports, tasty foods if you like a high fruit/fish diet.”

“Book me.” Crystal singers could be high-handed, at least on Ballybran.

“Blast-off at 2230 today,” Port Authority told her.

“Grand.” And Killashandra broke the connection.

She drew on the soberest garments in the press, randomly selected half a dozen, tossed them into a vapak, and closed it. She hesitated, mid-room, glancing about incuriously. It was, of course, the standard member room, and sterile. No trace of anything personal, of Killashandra.

“Because,” Killashandra said out loud as if her voice might at least be imprinted on the room, “I’m nothing but a crystal singer with only a present to live in.”

She slammed the door as she left but it didn’t do much to satisfy her discontent.

She had time to get the refracting lenses removed from her eyes. It didn’t change her outlook much. In fact, Ballybran looked duller than usual as she flitted to the Port Authority Terminal. She left the flit for any other crystal singer who might need transport from the terminal. She remembered at the last to punch through to the Guild Hall and give her off-planet destination. And she withdrew her priority rights on the Milekey lode until her return. If someone, and she felt it would be Larsdahl, wanted to try their luck there, they could for all of her. They might even make a good haul, now that the latest storm had changed the frequencies again.

Briefly her body ached for those resonances, for the dazzle of rainbow light prisms dancing off variegated quartz, for the pure sweet sound of crystal waking in the early morning sun, or sighing in the cold virginal light of one of the larger moons, for the subsonic hum that ate through bone in black cold night.

Then she dealt with the formalities of lifting off-world and settling in her cabin.

She entered the common room for the first time the third day out, having enjoyed a deep drug-sleep to purge the last of crystal sound from her blood and bone. She was hungry, for more than food, a hunger she could keep leashed as far as she herself was concerned. But the eight male passengers and the two crewmen who circulated in the transit territory were affected by her sensuality. There wasn’t anyone she wanted so she retired to her cabin and remained there the rest of the trip.

Armagh III’s Port Authority Terminal smelled of fish oil and glue. Great casks were being trundled into the hold of the freighter as she bade an impatient farewell to the passenger steward. She flashed her general credentials and was admitted unconditionally to the planet as a leisure guest. No problem so she hadn’t had to use her guild membership. Armagh III was an open planet.

She rented a flit and checked into the Touristas for a list of resorts. It was too lengthy and so she closed her eyes, and bought a ticket to the destination on which her finger settled: Trefoil, on the southeastern coast. She paused long enough to obtain a quick change of Armagh clothing, bright patterns in a lightweight porous weave, and was off.

Trefoil was small, a fishing town. Ships under sail were tacking across the harbor. She thought she’d seen sailships before but, of course, she couldn’t be sure. Her curiosity roused, she sauntered down to the docks to watch a huge two-master beat up the channel to the wharves, its crew bustling about the decks, which glinted with an almost crystalline sheen.

“What makes the decks shine?” she asked another observer.

“Fish oils,” was the somewhat terse reply and then the man, a red-bearded giant, took a second look. Men usually did at Killashandra. “First time on Armagh?”

Killashandra nodded, her eyes intent on the sailship.

“Been here long?”

“Just arrived.”

“Got a pad?”

“No.”

“Try the Golden Dolphin. Best food in town and best brewman.”

Killashandra turned to look at him then. “You pad there?”

“How else could I judge?” the man replied with charming candor.

Killashandra smiled back at him, neither coldly nor invitingly. Neutral. He reminded her of someone. They both turned back to watch the docking ship.

Killashandra found the process fascinating and silently applauded the well-drilled crew: each man seemed to perform his set task without apparent instruction from the man in the bridge house. The big hull drifted slowly sideways toward the wharf. The sails flapped, empty of wind, and were quickly gathered and fastened along the booms. Two crewmen flung lines ashore, fore and aft; then leaped after them when the distance closed, flipping the heavy lines deftly around the bollards and snubbing the ship securely.

Armagh men ran to height, tanned skins, and strong backs, Killashandra noticed approvingly. Redbeard was watching her out of the corner of his eye. He was interested in her all right. Just then, the nearest sailor turned landside, and waved in her direction. His teeth were startlingly white against the mahogany of his skin. He tossed back a streaked blond curly mane of hair and waved again. He wore the long oil-shiny pants of his profession and an oddly fashioned vest, which left chest and arms bare and seemed stiff with double hide along the ribs. He looked incredibly muscular. Was he waving at her? No, at Redbeard beside her, who now walked forward to meet his friend. A third man, black-bearded and tangle-maned, joined them, was embraced by Redbeard. The trio stood, facing the ship, talking among themselves until a fearsome machine glided along rails to their side of the dock. It extruded a ramp out and down, onto the deck of the boat, where it hovered expectantly. The two sailors had jumped back aboard, the blond man moving with the instinctive grace of the natural athlete so that the black-haired man looked clumsy in comparison. As a team, they heaved open the hatch. The hesitant ramp extruded clamps that fastened to the deck and the lip of the opened hold. More ramp disappeared into the maw of the ship. Moments later the ramp belt moved upward and Killashandra saw her first lunk, the great oil fish of Armagh, borne away on its last journey.

She became absorbed in the unloading process, which, for all the automated assistance of the machine, still required the human element. The oil scales of the huge fish did not always stay on the rough surface of the ramp belt and had to be forced back on manually. The blond used an enormous barbed hook, planting it deep in what was actually the very tough hide of the elusive fish and deftly flipping the body into place again. Redbeard seemed to have some official position for he made notes of the machine’s dials, used the throat mike often, and seemed to have forgotten her existence entirely. Killashandra approved. A man should get on with his work.

Yes, especially when he worked with such laudable economy of motion and effort. Like the young blond.

In fact, Killashandra was rather surprised when the ramp suddenly retracted and the machine slid sideways to the next hold. A small barefoot rascal of a lad slipped up to the crewmen, a tray of hot pies balanced on his head. The aroma was tantalizing and Killashandra realized that she’d not eaten since breaking fast on the freighter that morning. Before she could signal the rascal to her, his merchandise had been bought up by the seaman. Irritated, Killashandra looked landward. The docks couldn’t be dependent on the services of small boys. There must be other eating facilities nearby. There were, of course, but off-dock. With a backward glance at her blond sailor, contentedly munching from a pie in each hand, she left the wharf.

As it happened the eating house she chose displayed a placard advertising the Golden Dolphin. The hostelry was up the beach, set back amid a grove of frond-leaved trees, far enough around a headland from the town and the wharf so that commercial noise was muted. She took a room with a veranda looking out over the water. She changed into native clothing and retraced her steps along the quiet corridor to the public room.

“What’s the native brew?” she asked the barman, settling herself on the quaint high wooden stool.

“Depends on your capacity, m’dear,” the little black man told her, grinning a welcome.

“I’ve never disgraced myself.”

“Tart or sweet?”

“Hmmm. Tart, cool, and long.”

“There’s a concoction of fermented fruits, native to this globe, called ‘harmat.’ Powerful.”

“Keep an eye on me then, man. You call the limit.”

He nodded respectfully. He couldn’t know that a crystal singer had a metabolism that compensated for drug or narcotic or excess alcohol. A blessing-curse. Particularly if you were injured off-world, with no crystal around to draw the noise of accidental pain from your bones and muscles.

Harmat was tart, cool, and long, with a pleasant aftertaste that kept the mouth sweet and soothed the throat.

“A good drink for a sun world. And sailors.”

“Aye it is,” the barman said, his eyes twinkling. “And if it weren’t for them, we could export more.”

“I thought Armagh’s trade was fish oils and glue.”

The barman wrinkled his nose disdainfully. “It is. Harmat off-world commands a price, only trade rules say home consumption comes first.”

“Invent another drink.”

The barman frowned. “I try. Oh, I try. But they drink me dry of anything I brew.”

“You’re brewman as well?”

He drew himself up, straight and proud. “I gather the fruit from my own land, prepare it, press it, keg it, age it.”

She questioned him further, interested in another’s exacting trade, and thought if she weren’t a crystal singer, brewmaking would have been fun.

Biyanco, for that was the brewman’s name, chatted with her amiably—he was an amusing fellow—until the laughter and talk of a large crowd penetrated the quiet gloom of the public room.

“The fishermen,” he told her, busying himself by filling glass after glass after glass of harmat, lining them up along the bar.

He was none too soon, for the wide doors of the public room swung open and a horde of oil-trousered, vested men and women surged up to the bar, dark hands closing on the nearest glass, coins spinning and clicking to the wooden surface. Killashandra remained on her stool but she was pressed hard on both sides by thirsty people who spared her no glance until they’d finished the first and were bawling for a refill. Then she was rather casually, she felt, dismissed as the fisherfolk laughed and talked trade.

“You’d best watch that stuff,” said a voice in her ear and she saw Redbeard.

“I’ve been warned,” she answered, grinning.

“Biyanco makes the best harmat this side of the canal. It’s not a drink for the novice.”

“I’ve been warned,” she repeated, mildly amused at the half-insult. Of course, the man couldn’t know she was a crystal singer. So his warning had been kindly meant.

A huge bronzed fist brushed past her left breast. Startled, she looked up into the brilliant blue eyes of the blond sailor, received an incurious appraisal that warmed briefly in the way a man will look at a woman, and then grew cautious.

Killashandra looked away first, disturbed and disappointed. He was much too young for her. She turned back to Redbeard, who grinned as if he had watched the swift exchange of glances and was somehow amused by it.

“I’m Thursday, Shamus Thursday, ma’am,” the redbeard said.

“Killashandra is my name,” she replied and extended her hand.

He couldn’t have told her profession by her grip but the strength surprised him. She could see that. Killashandra was not a tall or heavily boned woman; crystal cutting does not need mass, only controlled energy and that could be developed in any arm.

“This is my good friend, Shad Tucker,” and Thursday gestured to the blond.

Thankful that the press of bodies made it impossible for her to do the courteous handshake, Killashandra nodded to Shad Tucker.

“And my old comrade of the wars, Tir Donnell,” Shamus Thursday motioned to the blackbeard, who also contented himself with a nod and grin at her. “You’d be here for a rest, Killashandra?” And when she nodded, “And why would you pick such a dull fisherman’s world as Armagh if you’d all the galaxy to choose from?”

Killashandra had heard that sort of question before, how many times she didn’t care to remember. She’d also heard the same charming invitation for confidence.

“Perhaps I like water sports,” she replied, smiling back at him, and not bothering to hide her appraisal.

To her surprise, he threw back his head and laughed. She could see where he’d trimmed the hairs from his throat, leaving a narrow band of white flesh that never saw sun. His two buddies said nothing but their eyes were on her.

“Perhaps you do, ma’am. And this is the place. Did you want the long wave ride? There’s a boat out every dawn.” Shamus looked at her questioningly. “Then water skating? Submarining? What is your pleasure, elusive Killashandra?”

“Rest. I’m tired.”

“Oh, I’d never think you’d ever known fatigue, ma’am!” The expression in his eyes invited her to confide.

“For someone unfamiliar with the signs, how would you know?”

“She’s got you there, Shamus,” said Tir Donnell, clapping his friend on the shoulder. Shad Tucker smiled, a sort of shy, amused smile, as if he hadn’t suspected her capable of caustic reply, and wasn’t sure he should enjoy it at his friend’s expense.

Shamus grinned, shrugged, and eyed Killashandra with respect. Then he bawled to Biyanco that his glass had a hole in it.

When the edge of their thirst had been satisfied, most of the fishermen left. “In search of other diversion,” Shamus said but he, Tir Donnell, and Shad Tucker merely settled stools around her and continued to drink.

She matched them, paid her rounds, and enjoyed Shamus’ attempts to pry information, any personal information, from her.

He was not, she discovered, easily put off, nor shy of giving facts about himself or his friends. They’d all worked the same fishing boat five seasons back, leaving the sea periodically as the monotony or bad fishing turned them off temporarily. Shamus had an interest in computers and often did wharfman’s chores if the regular men were away when ships came in. Tir Donnell needed some ready credit, was working the lunk season and would return to his regular job inland. Shad Tucker, the only off-worlder, had sailed the seas of four planets before he was landed on Armagh.

“Shad keeps saying he’ll move on, but he’s been here five years and more, and no sign of applying for a ticket-off,” Shamus told Killashandra.

Tucker only shrugged, the slight tolerant smile playing at the corner of his mouth, as if chary of admitting even that much about himself.

“Don’t let Shad’s reticence mislead you, ma’am,” Shamus went on, laying a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “He’s accredited for more than a lunk fisher. Indeed he is. Got mate’s tickets on four water worlds that make sailing Armagh look like tank bathing. Came here with a submariner rig one of the Anchorite companies was touting.” He shrugged, eloquently indicating that the company’s praise had fallen on deaf Armaghan ears.

“They’re tradition bound on Armagh,” Tucker said, his accent a nice change, soft on her ears. She had to sharpen her hearing to catch what he said. Shamus’ light baritone was almost harsh by contrast.

“How so?” she asked Shad, ignoring what Shamus started to say.

“They feel there is one good way to catch lunk when it’s in oil. By net. That way you don’t bruise the flesh so much and the lunk doesn’t struggle the way he does on a hook and sour the oil. The captains, they’ve a sense of location that doesn’t need sonic gear. I’ve sailed with five or six of the best and they always know when and where the lunk are running. And how many they can bring from that deep.”

And, thought Killashandra, bemused by Shad’s soft accent, you’d give your arm to develop that sense.

“You’ve fished on other worlds?” she asked out loud.

“Aye.”

“What, for instance?” He was as elusive with information as a fish. Or herself.

“Oh, spiderfish, crackerjaw, bluefin, skaters, and Welladay whales.”

The young man said it casually, as if encounters with such aquatic monsters were of no account. Shamus’ eyes were alight, as if he had accurately gauged the effect of that catalog on Killashandra.

“A crackerjaw opened his back for him on Spindrift,” Shamus said, proudly. “And he flew five miles with a skater and brought him down, the largest one ever recorded on Mandalay.”

Killashandra wasn’t sure why Shamus Thursday wished to extol his friend. But it made him more acceptable in her eyes. Shad was too young, anyhow. Killashandra made no further attempt to draw Shad out but turned to Tir Donnell and Shamus.

Despite a continued concern for her consumption of harmat, Shamus kept ordering until full dark closed abruptly down on the planet and the artificial lights came on in the room.

“Mealtime,” Biyanco announced in a loud, penetrating voice and activated a barrier that dropped over the bar. He appeared through a side door and briskly gestured them to a table for four on the other side of the room. Killashandra made no resistance to Shamus’ suggestion that they all dine together and she spent the rest of the evening in their company. And her night alone. By choice. She’d not made up her mind.

When the sun came up over the edge of the sea, she was down in the hotel’s private lagoon, floating on the buoyant waters, just as the lunk ships, sails fat with dawn winds, slid out to open sea with incredible speed.

To her surprise, Shamus appeared at midday and offered to show her Trefoil’s few diversions. Nothing loath, she went and found him most agreeable company, conversant on every phase of Trefoil’s domestic industry. He steered her from the usual tourist paths, for which she was grateful. She abhorred that label though that was, in essence, her status on any world but Ballybran. Nor did she give Shamus Thursday any hint of her profession despite all his attempts to wheedle the information from her.

It wasn’t exactly that she liked being secretive, but few worlds understood the function of crystal singers and some very odd habits and practices had been attributed to them. Killashandra had learned discretion and caution, and remembered them.

Late afternoon and a bleeper on Shamus’ belt alerted him to return to the dock, the fishing boats had been sighted.

“Sorry, m’dear,” he said as he executed a dipping turn of his fast flipper. “Duty calls.”

She elected to join him on the wharf, allowing him to think it was his company she preferred. Actually she wanted to watch the silent teamwork of docking, and see the mahogany figure of Shad Tucker in action. He was much too young for her, she told herself again, but a right graceful person to observe.

They’d had a quick plenteous catch that day, Killashandra was told as the fishermen drowned their thirsts in harmat at the Golden Dolphin. Tucker seemed unusually pleased and Killashandra could not resist asking why.

“He’s threatening to buy a ticket-off,’’ Shamus told her when Shad replied with an indolent shrug. “But he won’t go. He never does. He’s been here five years, longer than on any other planet.”

“Why?” Killashandra asked Shad, then had to hush Shamus. “Let Tucker reply. He knows his own mind, doesn’t he?”

Shad regarded her with mild surprise and the indolent look left his blue eyes, replaced by an intentness she found hard to ignore.

“This is a real sea world,’’ Shad said, picking his words in his soft-accented way, “not some half-evolved plankton puddle.”

He doesn’t open his lips wide enough to enunciate properly, she thought, and wondered why he guarded himself so.

“You’ve lunk for profit, territ and flatfish for fine eating, the crustaceans and bivalves for high livers, then the sea fruits for a constant harvest. Variety. I might buy myself a strip of land and stay.”

“You do ship on more than the lunk boats?”

Shad was surprised at her question. “All the boats fish lunk when it runs. Then you go after the others.”

“If you’ve a mind for drudgery,’’ said Tir Donnell gloomily.

Shad gave Tir a forebearing glance. “Lunk requires only muscle,” he said with a sly grin.

This appeared to be an old challenge, for Tir launched into a debate that Shad parried with the habit of long practice.

For the sake of being perverse, Killashandra took Tir Donnell to bed that night. She didn’t regret the experience although there was no harmony between them. His vehemence did take the edge off her hunger if it gave her no peace. She did not encourage him to ask for more. Somewhere, long ago, she’d learned the way to do that without aggravating a lover.

He was gone by dawn. Shamus dropped by a few hours later and took her to see a sea-fruit farm on the peninsula, ten kilometers from Trefoil to the south. When she assured Max Ennert, the farmer, of her depth-worthiness, they all fitted out with breather tanks and went submarine.

Enclosed by water, isolated by her trail of bubbles, though attached by guideline to Max and Shamus, Killashandra realized—probably for an uncountable time—why crystal singers sought water worlds. Below sea level, there was insulation against aural sound, relief from the play of noise against weary eardrums.

They drifted inches above the carefully tended sea gardens, Max and Shamus occasionally pruning off a ripe frond of grape or plum, shoving them in the net bags they towed. They bypassed reapers in a vast sea-valley where weed was being harvested. Occasionally loose strands would drift past them, the fuller longer ones deftly caught and netted by the men.

Killashandra was content to follow, slightly behind Max, slightly ahead of Shamus, craning her neck, angling her body to enjoy as much of the clear sea-view as possible. One or the other man checked her gauges from time to time. Euphoria could be a curse under sea and they didn’t know her capacity, nor the professional immunity she enjoyed.

Perhaps that was why Shamus argued with Max at one point, when they’d been below some two hours. They stayed down almost three more before they completed the circuit. As they walked out of the sea at Max’s landing, night was approaching with the usual tropical dispatch.

“Stay on, Shamus, Killashandra, if you’ve no other plans,” Max said but the words sounded rehearsed, strained.

She entered the room where she had changed to sea-dress and heard Shamus’ footsteps right behind her. She didn’t bother closing the door. He did, and had her in his arms the next instant. She made no resistance to his advance, nor did she respond. He held her from him, surprised, a question in his eyes.

“I’m not susceptible to euphorics, Shamus,” she told him.

“What are you talking about?” he asked, eyes wide with innocence.

“And I’ve submarined on more worlds than Shad has sailed.”

“Is it Tucker you’re after?” He didn’t seem jealous, merely curious.

“Shad’s ...” and she shrugged, unwilling to place the young man in any category.

“But you don’t fancy me?” Not aggrieved, again, merely curious.

She looked at him a long moment. “I think ...” she began, pausing as she voiced an opinion that had been subconscious till that moment, “... you remind me too much of someone I’ve been trying to forget.”

“Oh, just remind you?” Shamus’ voice was soft and coaxing, almost like Tucker’s. She put that young man firmly out of her mind.

“Not to worry, Shamus. The resemblance is purely superficial.”

His eyes twinkled merrily and Killashandra realized that the resemblance had been indeed purely superficial, for the other man would have responded with dark suspicion and urgent questions she’d have left unanswered purely to annoy him more.

“So, dark and mysterious lady, when you get to know me better. ...”

“Let me get to know you better first.”

They flitted back to Trefoil, circling over quays empty of any fishing craft.

“Lunk is moving offshore,” Shamus said. “Season’s about over, I’d say.”

“Does Tucker have enough for a ticket-off?”

“I wouldn’t know.” Shamus was busy landing. “But Tir needs one more good haul. And so, I suspect, does Skipper Garnsey. They’ll track school as far as there’s trace before they head in.”

Which was the substance of the message left for Shamus at the Golden Dolphin. So Killashandra, Shamus, and Biyanco talked most of the evening with damned few other drinkers at the bar.

That was why Killashandra got an invitation to go with Biyanco fruit-harvesting. “Land fruit for harmat,” Biyanco said with an odd shudder.

Shamus laughed and called him an incorrigible lubber. “Biyanco swears he’s never touched sea-fruit in his life.”

“Never have been that poor,” Biyanco said with some dignity.

The brewman roused her before dawn, his tractor purring outside her veranda. She dressed in the overall he’d advised and the combi-boots, and braided her hair tightly to her skull on the outward leg of their trip.

Trefoil nestled on the curved sands of a giant horseshoe bay, foothills at its back. Rain forests that were all but impenetrable swept up the hills, sending rank streamers across the acid road in vain attempts to cover that man-made tunnel into the drier interior.

Biyanco was amiable company, quiet at times, garrulous but interesting at others. He stopped off on the far side of the first range of foothills for lorries and climbers. None of the small boys and girls looked old enough, Killashandra thought, to be absent from schooling. All carried knives half again as long as their legs from sheaths thong-tied to their backs. All wore the coveralls and combi-boots with spurred clamp-ons for tree-climbing.

They chattered and sang, dangling their legs from the lorries as the tractor churned through the acid road. Occasionally one of them would wield his knife, chopping an impertinent streamer that clasped itself to a lorry.

Biyanco climbed farther above sea level by the winding acid road until he finally slowed down, peering at the roadside. Five kilometers later he let out an exclamation and veered the tractor to the left, his hands busy with dials and switches. A warning hoot brought every climber’s legs back into the lorries. Flanges, tilting downward, appeared along the lorry loadbeds and acid began to drip from this shield. Acid sprayed out, arcing well past the tractor’s leading edge, dissolving vegetations. Suddenly the tractor’s treads locked and ground on metal. Biyanco pushed a few toggles, closed a switch, and suddenly the tractor purred smoothly along the hidden track.

“Own this side of the mountain, you know,” Biyanco said, glancing at Killashandra to see the effect of his announcement. “Ah, you thought I was only a barman, didn’t you? Surprised you, didn’t I? Ha.” The little man was pleased.

“You did.”

“I’ll surprise you more before the day is over.”

Which he did, sprier than she’d ever thought him, and elated with his success. She was glad for his sake and somewhat puzzled on her own account. He was adept enough so that she ought to have enjoyed it, too. Was there crystal in her soul, after all? Was she too old to love?

They’d reached their destination, a permaformed clearing with acid-roofed buildings that housed his processing unit and temporary living quarters. The climbers he’d escorted went farther on, sending the lorries off on automated tracks, six climbers to each lorry. They’d evidently climbed for him before and in the teams they now assembled, for he gave a minimum of instruction before dismissing them to pick.

Then he’d shown Killashandra into the processing plant and explained the works succinctly.

Each of the teams worked a different fruit, he told her. The secret of good harmat lay in the careful proportions and blending of dead ripe fruit. There were as many blends of harmat as there were fish in the sea. His had made the Golden Dolphin famous; that’s why so many Armaghans patronized the hostelry. None of this vapid, innocuous stuff came from his stills. Harmat took months to bring to perfection: the fruit he’d process today would not be fermented for nine months and would not be offered for sale for six years. Then he took her below ground, to the cool dark storage area, deep in the permaform. He showed her the automatic alarms if the vicious digger roots of the jungle ever penetrated the permaform, he wore a bleeper on his belt at all times (he never did remove the belt but it was made of soft tough fiber). He let her sample the brews and it amused her that he would sip abstemiously while filling her cup full. Because she liked him and she’d learned about harmat from him, she gradually imitated drunk.

He’d had a good deal of experience, Killashandra had to admit, and he tried his damnedest to bring her to pitch but the frequency was wrong, as it had been with Tir, would have been with Shamus, and this badly puzzled Killashandra. She ought not to have such trouble off-world.

While Biyanco slept, before the full lorries glided back to their clearing, she probed her patchy memory, again and again stopped by Larsdahl’s cynical laugh. Damn the man! He was haunting her even on Armagh. He had no right to taint everything she touched, every association she tried to enjoy. She could remember, too, enough snatches to know that her previous break had been as disastrous. Probably other breaks, too. In the quiet cool dark of the sleeping room, Biyanco motionless with exhaustion beside her, Killashandra bleakly cursed Larsdahl. For he’d sworn she would find fulfillment with no other lover if she left his bed. Laughing, she’d left him, sure then of herself where she was completely unsure now. “Crystal in her soul?”

Experimentally she ran her hand down her bare body, to the hard flesh of her thighs, the softness of her belly, her firm breasts. She’d had her children decades before, they’d be grown and parents. Maybe grandparents. You never conceived once you sang crystal. Small loss, she thought, and then, suddenly, wasn’t sure.

Damn, damn! Damn Larsdahl. She’d found the Milekey lode. She had the priority right. He couldn’t have mined it, he couldn’t sing the right resonances, he didn’t have the cutting skill for the light quartzes. She’d tried, grant her that, to show him but they’d crack, he simply hadn’t the sense of pitch. At least for rose crystal. And then he’d withheld the gift of peace from her body because she wouldn’t . . . because she couldn’t . . . teach him her trick of pitch.

“You have it or you haven’t, Larsdahl,” she’d told him, implored him, shouted at him. “You can’t be taught any more than you can teach crystal singing to the deaf! I can’t help you!’’

There’d been bitter recriminations, physical battles, because Larsdahl hadn’t wanted to let her go even after he’d jeopardized their partnership with his insistence. She’d had to invoke guild protection, something a crystal singer ought not to have to do. But it had sobered Larsdahl and he’d let her alone. Not entirely alone: there’d be the odd message from another singer. Or, the verbal communication for Lanzecki to pass on. Lanzecki ought to know better.

And you didn’t, damn it, need two to work her priority range. The sounds were too pure: two ears were better than four. Two bodies inhibited the purities, muddied the pitch. She’d learned that much from Larsdahl.

The sound of the returning lorries, the singing of the climbers, roused Biyanco. He blinked at her, having forgot in his sleeping that he’d taken a woman again. With solemn courtesy, he thanked her for their intercourse, and having dressed, excused himself with grave ceremony. At least a man had found pleasure in her body, she thought.

She bathed, dressed, and joined him as the full fruit bins began spilling their colorful contents into the washing pool. Biyanco was seated at the controls, his nimble fingers darting here and there as he weighed each bin, computed the price, and awarded each chief his crew’s chit. It was evidently a good pick, judging by the grins on every face, including Biyanco’s.

As each lorry emptied, it swiveled around and joined the line on the tractor that was also headed homeward. All were shortly in place and then the second part of the processing began. The climbers took themselves off under the shade of the encroaching jungle and ate their lunches.

Abruptly noise pierced Killashandra’s ears. She let out a scream, stifling a repetition against her hand but not soon enough to escape Biyanco. The noise ceased. Trembling with relief, Killashandra looked around, astonished that no one else seemed affected by the appalling shriek.

“You are a crystal singer, then, aren’t you?” asked Biyanco, steadying her as she rocked on her feet. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t sure but I forgot the crystals in the drive have been off. Honest I did, or I’d have warned you.” He was embarrassed and earnest.

“You should have them balanced,” Killashandra replied angrily and immediately apologized. “How could you know I might be a crystal singer?”

Biyanco looked away from her now. “Things I’ve heard.”

“What have you heard?”

He looked at her then, his eyes steady. “That a crystal singer can sound notes that’ll drive a man mad. That they lure men to them, seduce them, and then kidnap ‘em away to Ballybran and they never come back.”

Killashandra smiled, a little weakly because her ears still ached. “What made you think I wasn’t?”

“Me!” He jabbed at his chest with a juice-stained finger. “You slept with me.”

She reached out and touched his cheek gently. “You are a good man, Biyanco, besides being the best brewman on Armagh. And I like you. But you should get those crystals balanced.”

Biyanco glanced over at the offending machinery and grimaced, “The balancer’s got a waiting list as long as Murtagh River,” he said. “You look pale. How about a drink? Harmat’ll help ... oh, you are a witch,” he added, chuckling as he realized that she couldn’t’ve been as drunk as she’d acted. Then a smile tugged his lips across his face. “Ohho, you are a something, Killashandra of Ballybran. I should’ve spotted your phony drunk, and me a barman all these decades.” He chuckled again. “Well, harmat’ll help your nerves.” He clicked his fingers at one of the climber chiefs and the boy scampered into the living quarters, back again in a trice with glasses and a flask of chilled harmat.

She drank eagerly, both hands on the glass because she was still shaky. The cool tartness was soothing, though, and she wordlessly held the glass out for a refill. Biyanco’s eyes were kind and somewhat anxious. He knew what unbalanced crystalline shrieks did to the sensitive nerves of a singer.

“You’ve not been harmed by it, have you?”

“No. No, Biyanco, we’re tougher than that. It was the surprise. I wasn’t expecting you to have crystal-driven equipment. ...”

He grinned slyly. “We’re not backward on Armagh for all we’re quiet and peaceful. “ He leaned back from her, regarding her with fresh interest. “Is it true that crystal singers don’t grow old?”

“There’re disadvantages to that, my friend.”

He raised his eyebrows in polite contradiction. But she only smiled as she steadily sipped the harmat until all trace of pain had eased from her nerves.

“You told me you’ve only a certain time to process ripe fruit. If you’ll let me take the tractor down the rails past the first ridge . . . No. . . .” and she vetoed her own suggestion arriving at an impulsive alternative. “How long do you have before the pick sours?”

“Three hours, tops,” and in Biyanco’s widening eyes she saw incredulous gratitude as he understood her intention. “You wouldn’t?” he said in a voiceless whisper.

“I could and I would. That is, if you’ve the tools I need.”

“I’ve tools,” and, as if afraid she’d renege, he propelled her toward the machine shed.

He had what she needed, but the bare minimum. Fortunately, the all important crystal saws and knives were still very sharp and true. With two pairs of knowledgeable hands (Biyanco had put the driver together himself when he updated the plant’s machinery thirty years ago), it was no trick at all to get down to the crystals.

“They’re in thirds,” he told her needlessly.

“Pitch?”

“B-flat minor.”

“Minor? For heavy work like this?”

“Minor because it isn’t that continuous a load and minors don’t cost what majors do,” Biyanco replied crisply.

Killashandra nodded, accepting the oblique snub. She hit the B-flat and the crystal hummed sweetly in tune. So did the D. It was the E that was sour—off by a half-tone. She cut off the resonance before the sound did more than ruffle her nerves. With Biyanco carefully assisting her, she freed the crystal of its brackets, cradling it tenderly in her hands. It was a blue, from the Ghanghe Range, more than likely, and old, because the blues were worked out now.

“The break’s in the top of the prism, here,” she said, tracing the flaw. “The bracket may have shifted with vibration.”

“G’delpme, I weighed those brackets and felted them proper. ...”

“Not to worry, Biyanco. Probably the expansion coefficient differs in this rain forest enough to make even properly set felt slip. Thirty years they’ve been in? You worked well.”

They decided to shift pitch down, which meant she had to recut all three crystals, but that way he’d have a major triad. Because she trusted him, she let him watch as she cut and tuned. She had to sustain pitch with her voice after she had warmed them enough to sing, but she could hold a true pitch long enough to place the initial, and all-important cuts.

It was wringing wet work, even with the best of equipment and in a moderate climate. She was exhausted by the time they reset the felted brackets. In fact, he elbowed her out of the way when he saw how her hands trembled.

“Just check me,” he asked but she didn’t need to. He was spry in more than one way. She was glad she’d tuned the crystals for him. But he was too old for her.

She felt better when he started the processer again and there was no crystal torture.

“You get some rest, Killashandra. This’ll take a couple more hours. Why don’t you stretch out on the tractor van seat? It’s wide enough. That way you can rest all the way back to Trefoil.”

“And yourself, Biyanco?”

He grinned like the old black imp he was. “I’m maybe a shade younger than you, crystal singer Killashandra. But we’ll never know, will we?”

She slept, enervated by the pitching and cutting, but she woke when Biyanco opened the tractor door. The hinge squeaked in C-sharp.

“Good press,” he said when he saw she was awake. Behind in the lorries, the weary climbers chanted to themselves. One was a monotone. Before he could get on her nerves, they’d reached the village. The lorries were detached and the climbers melted into the darkness. Biyanco and Killashandra continued on the acid road back to Trefoil

It was close to dawn before they pulled up at the Golden Dolphin.

“Killashandra?”

“Yes, Biyanco?”

“I’m in your debt.”

“No, for we exchanged favors.”

He made a rude noise. And she smiled at him. “We did. But if you need a price, Biyanco, then it’s your silence on the subject of crystal singers.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m human, no matter what you’ve heard of us. And I must have that humanity on equal terms or I’ll shatter one day among the quartz. It’s why we have to go off-world.”

“You don’t lure men back to Ballybran?”

“Would you come with me to Ballybran?”

He snorted. “You can’t make harmat on Ballybran.”

She laughed for he had given the right answer to ease his own mind. The tractor moved off softly in first.

She slept the sun around and woke the second dawn refreshed. She lazed in the water, having been told by the pug-nosed host that the lunk ships were still out. Biyanco greeted her that noonday with pleasantries and no references to favors past, present, or future. He was old enough, that brewman, she thought, to know what not to say.

She wondered if she should leave Trefoil and flit around the planet. There’d be other ports to visit, other fishermen to snare in the net of her attraction. One of them might be strong enough, must be strong enough to melt the crystal in her. But she tarried and drank harmat all afternoon until Biyanco made her go eat dinner.

She knew the lunk boats were in even before the parched seamen came thronging up the beachroad, chanting their need. She helped Biyanco draw glasses against their demand, laughing at their surprise to see her working behind the bar. Only Shad Tucker seemed unamazed.

Shamus was there, too, with Tir Donnell, teasing her as men have teased barmaids for centuries. Tucker sat on a stool in the corner of the bar and watched her, though he drank a great deal of harmat to “unstick his tongue from the roof of his mouth.”

Biyanco made them all go eat, to lay a foundation for more harmat, he said. And when they came back, they brought a squeeze box, a fiddle, two guitars, and a flute. The tables were stacked against the wall and the music and dancing began.

It was good music, too, true-pitched so Killashandra could enjoy it, tapping her foot to the rhythms. And they played until the musicians pleaded for a respite, and leaving their instruments on the bar, swept out to the cool evening beach to get a second wind.

Killashandra had been dancing as hot and heavy as any woman, partnered with anyone who felt like dancing, including Biyanco. Everyone except Tucker, who stayed in his corner and watched . . . her.

When the others left to cool off, she wandered over to him. His eyes were a brighter blue in the new red-tan of his face. He was picking his hands now and again because the last of the lunks had an acid in their scales that ate flesh. And he’d had to grab some barehanded at the last.

“Will they heal?” she asked.

“Oh, sure. Be dry tomorrow. New skin in a week. Doesn’t hurt.” Shad looked at his hands impersonally and then went on absently sloughing off the dying skin.

“You weren’t dancing.”

The shy grin twisted up one corner of his mouth and he ducked his head a little, looking at her from the side of his eyes.

“I’ve done my dancing. With the fish the past days. I like to watch, anyhow.”

He unwound himself from the stool to reach out and secure the nearest guitar. He picked a chord, winced so he didn’t see her shudder at the discord. Lightly he plucked the strings, twisting the tuning knob on the soured G, adjusting the E string slightly, striking the chord again and nodding with approval.

Killashandra blinked. The man had perfect pitch.

He began to play, softly, with a style totally different from the raucous tempi of the previous musicians. His picking was intricate and the rhythm sophisticated, yet the result was a delicate shifting of pattern and tone that enchanted Killashandra. It was improvisation at its best, with the player as intent upon the melody he produced as his only audience.

The beauty of his playing, the beauty of his face as he played, struck an aching in her bones. When his playing ceased, she felt empty.

She’d been leaning toward him, perched on a stool, elbows on her knees, supporting her chin with cradled hands. So he leaned forward, across the guitar, and kissed her gently on the mouth. They rose, as one, Shad putting the guitar aside to fold her in his arms and kiss her deeply. She felt the silk of his bare flesh beneath her hands, the warmth of his strong body against hers and then ... the others came pouring back with disruptive noise. The mood he had so delicately created was brutally torn apart.

As well, thought Killashandra, as Shamus boisterously swung her up to the beat of a rough dance. When next she looked over her shoulder, Shad was cornered and watching, the slight smile on his lips, his eyes still on her.

He is much much too young for me, she told herself, and I am very fragile with too much living.

The next day she nursed what must have been her first hangover. She’d tried hard enough to acquire one. She lay on the beach in the shade and tried not to move unnecessarily. Otherwise she’d ache and hurt. No one bothered her until midday; presumably everyone was nursing hangovers of their own. Then Shad’s large feet stopped on the sand beside her pallet. Shad’s big knees cracked as he bent over her and his peeling hand tipped back the wide hat she wore against sun glare.

“You’ll feel better if you eat this,” he said, speaking very softly. He held out a small tray with a frosted glass and a plate of fruit chips on it.

She wondered if he were enunciating with extra care for she understood every soft word, even if she resented the gist of them. She groaned and he repeated his advice. Then he put gentle hands on her, raising her torso so she could drink without spilling. He fed her, piece by piece as a man feeds a sick and fretful child.

She felt sick and she was fretful but, when all the food and drink were in her belly, she had to admit that his advice was sound.

“I never get drunk.”

“Probably not. But you also don’t dance yourself bloody-footed either.”

Her feet were tender, come to think of it, and when she examined the soles, discovered blisters and myriad thin scratches.

Tucker sat with her all afternoon, saying little. When he suggested a swim, she complied and the lagoon water was cooler than she’d remembered, or maybe she was hotter for all she’d been lying in the shade.

When they emerged from the water, she felt human, even for a crystal singer. And she admired his straight tall body, the easy grace of his carriage, and the fineness of his handsome face. But he was much too young for her. She would have to try Shamus for she needed a man’s favors again.

Evidently it was not Shad’s intention that she find Shamus for he persuaded her that she didn’t want to eat in the hostelry; that it would be more fun to dig for bivalves where the tide was going out, in a cove he knew of, a short walk away. It is difficult to argue with a soft-spoken man, who is taller than you by six inches, and can carry you easily under one arm . . . even if he is a century or so younger.

And it was impossible not to touch his silky flesh when he brushed past her to tend the baking shellfish, or when he passed her wine-steeped fruit chips and steam roots.

When he looked at her, sideways, his blue eyes darker now, reflecting the fire and the night, it was beyond her to resist his importunities.

She woke on the dark beach, before the dying fire, with his sleeping weight against her side. Her arms were wrapped around his right arm, her head cradled on the cup of his shoulder. Without moving her head, she could see his profile. And she knew there wasn’t any crystal in her soul. She could still give . . . and receive. For all she sang crystal, she still possessed that priceless human quality, annealed in the fire of his youth.

She’d been wrong to dismiss him for what was a mere chronological accident, irrelevant to the peace and solace he brought her. Her body was exultant, renewed.

Her stretching roused him to smile with unexpected sweetness into her eyes. He gathered her against him, the vibrant strength of his arms tempered to tenderness for her slight frame.

“You crazy woman,” he said, in a wondering voice as he lightly scrubbed her scalp with his long fingers and played with her fine hair. “I’ve never met anyone like you before.”

“Not likely to again.” Please!

He grinned down at her, delighted by her arrogance.

“Do you travel much?” he asked.

“When the mood strikes me.”

“Don’t travel for awhile.”

“I’ll have to one day. I’ve got to go back to work, you know.”

“What work?”

“I’m a guild member.”

His grin broadened and he hugged her. “All right. I won’t pry.” His finger delicately traced the line of her jaw. “You can’t be as old as you make out,” he said for she’d been honest enough earlier to tell him they were not contemporary.

She answered him now with a laugh but his comment brought a chill to her.

It couldn’t have been an accident that he could relieve her, she thought, caressing his curving thigh. She panicked suddenly at the idea that, once tasted, she could not drink again and strained herself to him.

His arms tightened and his low laugh was loving to her ears. And their bodies fit together again as fully and sweetly in harmony as before. Yes, with Shad Tucker, she could dismiss all fear as baseless.

Their pairing-off was accepted by Shamus and Tir who had his ready credit now and was off to apply it to whatever end he’d had in mind. Only Biyanco searched her face and she’d shrugged and given the brewman a little reassuring smile. Then he’d peered closely at Shad and smiled back.

That was why he said nothing. As she’d known he wouldn’t. For Shad Tucker wasn’t ready to settle on one woman. Killashandra was an adventure to him, a willing companion for a man just finished a hard season’s work.

They spent the days together as well, exploring the coastline in both directions from Trefoil, for Shad had a mind to put his earnings in land or sea front. She had never felt so . . .so vital and alive. He had a guitar of his own that he’d bring, playing for hours little tunes he’d make up when they were becalmed and had to take shelter in the shade of the sail from Armagh’s biting noonday sun. She loved to look at him while he played; his absorption had the quality of an innocent boy discovering major Truths of Beauty, Music, and Love. Indeed, his face, when he caressed her to a fever pitch of love, retained that same youthful innocence and intent absorption. Because he was so strong, because his youth was so powerful, his delicate, restrained love-making was all the more surprising to her.

The days multiplied and became weeks but so deep was her contentment that the first twinge of uneasiness caught her unawares. She knew what it was, though: her body’s cry for crystal song.

“Did I hurt you?” asked Shad for she was in his arms.

She couldn’t answer so she shook her head. He began to kiss her slowly, leisurely, sure of himself. She felt the second brutal knock along her spine and twisted herself closer in his arms so he wouldn’t feel it and she could forget that it had happened.

“What’s wrong, Killashandra?”

“Nothing. Nothing that you can’t cure.”

So he did. But afterward, she couldn’t sleep and stared up at the spinning moons. She couldn’t leave Shad now. Time and again he’d worked his magic with her until she’d’ve sworn all crystal thought was purged. Until she’d even toyed with the notion of resigning from the guild. When crystal got too bad, she could tune sour crystal on Armagh. But she must stay with Shad. He held back fear, he brought her peace. She’d waited for a lover like Shad Tucker so long, she had the right to enjoy the relationship.

The next moment another spasm struck her, hard, sharp, fierce. She fought it though her body arched with pain. And she knew she couldn’t resign. That she was being inexorably drawn back. And she did not want to leave Shad Tucker.

To him, she was a novelty, a woman to make love to...now...when the lunk season had been good and man needed to relax. But Killashandra was not the sort of woman he’d build a home for on his acres of sea-front. For her, she loved him: for his youth, for his absurd gentleness and courtesy; because, in his arms, she was briefly ageless.

The profound cruelty of her situation was driven home to her mind as bitterly as the next hunger pain for crystal sound.

It isn’t fair, she cried piteously. It isn’t fair. I can’t love him. It isn’t fair. He’s too young. He‘ll forget me in other loves. And I. . . I’ll not be able to remember him. That was the cruelest part.

She began to cry, Killashandra who had foresworn tears for any man half a century before when the harmony between herself and Larsdahl had turned discordant. Her weeping, soft as it was, woke Shad. He comforted her, lovingly and complicated her feelings for him by asking no questions at all. Maybe, she thought with the desperation of fearful hope, he isn’t that young. He might want to remember me.

And, when her tears had dried on her face, he kissed her again, with an urgency that must be answered. And was, as fully and sweetly as ever.

The summons came two days later. Biyanco tracked them in the cove and told her only that she had an urgent message. She was grateful for that courtesy but she hated the brewman for bringing the message at all.

It was a guild summons all right; she had to go back and sing rose crystal. Implicit in the message was a guild warning: she’d been away too long from crystal. What crystal gave, it took away. She stared at her reflection in the glass panel of the message booth. Yes, crystal could take away her appearance of youthfulness. How long would Shad remember the old woman she would shortly become?

So she started out to say goodbye to him. Best have it done quickly and now! Then back to Ballybran and forgetfulness in the crystal song. She felt cold all over.

He was sitting by the lagoon, strumming his guitar, his face absorbed in a melody he’d composed for her. It was a pretty tune, one that stopped in the mind and woke you humming it the next day.

Killashandra caught back her breath: Shad had perfect pitch: he could come with her, to Ballybran. She’d train him herself to be a crystal singer.

“Don’t,” said Biyanco stepping to her side.

“Don’t what?” she asked coldly.

“If you really love him, Killashandra, don’t. He’ll remember you this way. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”

It was, of course, because she wouldn’t. So she stood there, beside Biyanco, and listened to Shad sing, watched the boyish absorption on his beloved face and let cruelty wash hope out of her.

“It never works, does it, Killashandra?” Biyanco asked gently.

“No.” She had a fleeting recollection of Larsdahl. They’d met somewhere, off-world. Hadn’t they? They must have. Had she been lured to Ballybran by some ageless lover? Perhaps. Who knew? The difference was that now, she was old enough not to play the siren for crystal. Old enough to leave love while he was young, and still in love enough to remember her only as a woman.

“No one forgets you, Killashandra,” Biyanco said, his eyes dark and sad, as she turned to leave.

“Maybe I can remember that much.”