At her voice command, the viewscreen showed Streaker's goal, the red giant star, magnified tremendously, the whirling filamentary structure of its inflamed chromosphere extending beyond the width of any normal solar system. Izmunuti's bloated surface seethed, sending out tongues of ionized gas, rich with the heavy elements that made up Sara's own body.

Purofsky thinks the Buyur had ways to meddle with a star.

Even without that awesome thought, it was a stirring sight to behold. Past those raging fires had come all the sneakships that deposited their illicit seed on Jijo, along with the varied hopes of each founding generation. Their aspirations had ranged from pure survival, for humans and g'Keks, all the way to the hoonish ancestors who apparently came a long way in order to play hooky.

All those hopes will come crashing down, unless Streaker can make it to Izmunuti's fires.

Sara still had no idea how Gillian Baskin hoped to save Jijo. Would she let the enemy catch up and then blow this ship up, in order to take the Jophur out, as well?

A brave ploy, but surely the enemy would be prepared for that, and take precautions.

Then what?

It seemed Sara would find out when the time came.

She felt bad about the kids-Huck, Alvin, and the others. But they were adults now, and volunteers.

Anyway, the sages say it's a good omen for members of all six races to be present when something vital is about to happen.

Sara's own reasons for coming went beyond that.

Purofsky said one of us had to take the risk-either him or me-and go with Streaker, on the slim chance that she makes it.

One of us should try to find out if it's true. What we figured out about the Buyur.

All her life's work, in mathematical physics and linguistics, seemed to agree with Purofsky's conclusion.

Jijo was no accident.

Oh, if she delved into psychology, she might find other motives underlying her insistence on being the one to go.

To continue taking care of Emerson, perhaps?

But the wounded starman was now with those who loved him. Shipmates he had risked death alongside, many times before. After overcoming initial shame, Emerson had found ways to be useful. He did not need Sara anymore.

No one really needs me.

Face it. You^re going out of curiosity.

Because you are Melina's child.

Because you want to see what happens next.

Dwer IT WAS A GOOD THING HE REMEMBERED ABOUT AIR. There would be none on the other side. By twisting through the barrier, writhing, and making his body into a hoop, Dwer managed to create a tunnel opening from his prison sphere into the next. A brief hurricane swiftly emptied the atmosphere from his former cell until the pressure equalized. He then pushed through, letting the opening close behind him.

Dwer's ears popped and his pulse pounded. The trick had severely diluted the available air, taking him from near-sea-level pressure to the equivalent of a mountaintop in just half a dura. Speckles danced before his eyes. His body would not last long at this rate.

There was another reason to hurry. As he departed the sphere containing the balloon remnants, he had seen shadows touch beyond the far side. Jophur robots. Come to inspect their first captive.

His gear had settled against the golden surface of his new cell. Dwer grabbed the makeshift pack and moved toward the only possible place of refuge-the nose of the imprisoned starship.

It looked nothing like the ma.s.sive Jophur vessel, but resembled a pair of spoons, welded face-to-face, with the bulbous end forward. Fortunately, the enclosure barely cleared the ship, fore and aft. A bank of dim windows nearly touched the golden surface.

And there's a door!

Dwer gathered strength, flexed his legs, and launched toward the beckoning airlock. He sailed across the gap and barely managed to snag a protruding bracket with the tip of his left hand.

If this takes some kind of secret code, I'm screwed.

Fortunately, the dolphin work crews had a standard procedure for entering and converting Buyur wrecks. He had accompanied them on some trips, lending a hand. Dwer was glad to see the makeshift locking mechanism still in place, set to work in a fashion that even a Jijoan hunter might understand.

To open . . . turn k.n.o.b.

Dwer's luck held. It rotated.

If there's air inside, the wind will blow out. If there's none, I'll be blown in . . . and die.

He had to brace his feet against the hull and pull in order to get the hatch moving. Vision narrowed to a tunnel and Dwer knew he was just duras away from blacking out. . . .

A sudden breeze rushed at him, whistling with force from the ship's interior. !

Stale air. Stinky, stale, dank, wonderful air.

Gillian I have read in Earth lore about cetaceans and their glorious Whale Dream. What music might we make, when these strange beings add their voices to our chorus?

And after that, who knew? Lorniks, chimps, and zookirs? The Kiqui creatures the dolphins brought from far away? A melange of vocalizations, then. Perhaps a civilization worthy of the name.

All that lay ahead, a glimmering possibility, defying all likelihood or reason. For now, the council was made of those who had earned their place by surviving on Jijo. Partaking of the world. Raising offspring whose atoms all came from the renewing crust of their mother planet. This trait pervaded the musical harmony of the Eight.

We inhale Jijo, with each and every breath.

So Phwhoon-dau umbled in the deep, rolling vibrations of his throat sac.

We drink her waters. At death, our loved ones put us into her abyss. There we join the patterned rhythms of the world: THE BAD NEWS WAS NOT EXACTLY UNANTIc.i.p.aTED, Still, she had hoped for better.

As the Jophur ship finished adding another swarm of decoys to its prison chain, the cruiser shifted its attention elsewhere, accelerating to pursue the next chosen group, Soon the truth became clear.

Streaker's luck had just run out.

Well, they chose right this time, she thought. It had to happen, sooner or later.

Streaker was square in the enemy's sights, with seven mictaars of hypers.p.a.ce yet to cross before reaching safety.

The Sages THERE ARE OTHERS ON JIJO NOW, PHWHOON-DAU thought, knowing that even eight would not be enough for long. In time, the new dolphin colonists must be invited to join.

The presence that joined them was at once both familiar and awesome. The council felt it throb in each note of the flute or myriiton. It permeated the clatter of the glaver's rattle, and the wry empathy glyphs of the tytlal.

For generations, their dreams had been brushed by the Egg. Its soft cadences repaid each pilgrimage, helping to unite the Commons.

But during all those years, the sages had known. It only sleeps. We do not know what will happen when it wakes.

Was the Egg only rousing now because the council finally had its missing parts? Or had the cruel Jophur ray shaken it from slumber?

Phwhoon-dau liked to think that his old friend Vubben was responsible.

Or else, perhaps, it was simply time.

The echoes steadily increased. Phwhoon-dau felt them with his feet, reverberating beneath the surface, building to a crescendo. An accretion of pent-up power. Of purpose.

Such energy. What will happen when it is liberated? His sac pulsed with umbles, painful and mightier than he ever produced before.

Phwhoon-dau envisioned the mountain caldera blowing up with t.i.tanic force, spilling lava down the tortured aisles of Festival Glade.

As it turned out, the release came with nothing more physical than a slight trembling of the ground.

And yet they all staggered when it flew forth, racing faster than the speed of thought.

The Slope TO NELO-STANDING IN THE RUINS OF HIS PAPER mill, exhausted and discouraged after a long homeward slog-it came as a rapid series of aromas.

The sweet-sour odor of pulped cloth, steaming as it poured across the drying screens.

The hot-vital skin smell of his late wife, whenever her attention turned his way after a long day spent pouring herself into their peculiar children.

The smell of Sara's hair, when she was three years old . . . addictive as any drug.

Nelo sat down hard on a shattered wall remnant, and though the feelings pa.s.sed through him for less than a kidura, something shattered within as he broke down and wept.

"My children . . ." Nelo moaned. "Where are they?"

Something told him they were no longer of his world.

To Fallen-staked down and spread-eagled in an underground roul shambler's lair, waiting for death-the sensation arrived as a wave of images. Memories, yanked back whole.

The mysterious spike trees of the Sunrise Plain, farther east than anyone had traveled in a century.

Ice floes of the northwest, great floating mountains with snowy towers, sculpted by the wind.

The shimmering, teasing phantasms of the Spectral Flow . . . and the oasis of Xi, where the gentle Illias had invited him to live out his days, sharing their secrets and their n.o.ble horses.

Fallen did not cry out. He knew Dedinger and his fanatics were listening, just beyond this cave in the dunes. When the beast returned home, they would get no satisfaction from the former chief scout of the Commons.

Still, the flood of memory affected him. Fallen shed a single tear of grat.i.tude.

A life is made whole only in its own eyes. Fallen looked back on his, and called it good.

To Uriel-interrupted in a flurry of new projects-the pa.s.sing wave barged through as an unwelcome interruption. A waste of valuable time. Especially when all her apprentices laid down their tools and stared into s.p.a.ce, uttering low, reverent moans, or sighs, or whinnies.

Uriel knew it for what it was. A blessing. To which she had a simple reply.

So what?

She just had too much on her mind to squander duras on things that were out of her control.

In GalTwo she commented, dryly.

"Glad I am, that you have finally decided. Pleased that you, O long-lived Egg, have deigned to act, at last. But forgive me if I do not pause long to exult. For many of us, life is far too short."

To Ewasx-moments later and half a light-year away-it came as a brief, agonizing vibration in the wax. Ancient wax, acc.u.mulated over many jaduras by the predecessor stack-an old traeki sage.

Involuntary steam welled up the shared core of the stack, bypa.s.sing the master ring to waft as a compact cloud from the topmost opening.

Praised be destiny. . . .

Other ring stacks drew away from Ewasx, unnerved by the singular aromatics, accented with savage traces of Jijoan soil.

But the senior Jophur Priest-Stack responded automatically to the reverent smoke, bowing and adding: Amen ...

even had to quash an urge to go chasing after the d.a.m.ned stone!

Leave it, and good riddance, he thought, and nodded to Ling.

"Right, let's go."

Dwer LARK, YOUR HAND!"

He trembled, fighting to control the fit that came suddenly, causing him to s.n.a.t.c.h the amulet from around his neck. He clutched the stone tight, even when it began to burn his flesh.

Crouched behind a set of strange obelisks-their only shelter in the s.p.a.cious Jophur control room-Lark dared not cry out from pain. He fought not to thrash about as Ling used both hands to pry at his clenched fist. At last, the stone sliver fell free, tumbling across his lap to the floor, leaving a stench of singed flesh. Even now, the heat kept building. They tried backing away, but the stone's temperature continued rising until a fierce glow made it hard to see.

"No!" Lark whispered harshly as Ling dived toward the blaze, reaching for the thong. To his surprise, enough was still attached for her to grab a loop and whirl it once, then twice around her head, as if slinging a piece of flaming sun.

She let go, hurling Lark's talisman in an arc across the busy chamber, toward the center of the room.

Dismayed whistles ensued, accompanied by waves of aromatic stench so overpowering, Lark almost gagged.

"Why the h.e.l.l did you-" he began, but Ling tugged his arm.

"We need a distraction. Come on, now's our chance!"

Lark blinked, amazed by the power of habit. He was actually angry at her for throwing away his amulet, and INSIDE THE DECOY SHIP, HE COLLAPSED ON THE deck and retched, heaving up what little remained in his stomach.

Midway through that unpleasant experience, another, completely different kind of disorientation abruptly swept over Dwer. For a moment, it seemed as if One-of-a-Kind were inside his head, trying to speak again. The strange, heady sensation might have been almost affable, if his body weren't racked with nausea.

It ended before he had a chance to appraise what was happening. Anyway, by then he figured he had wasted enough time.

The Jophur won't take long picking through my little urrish balloon. They'll start on this bubble next.

In full gravity, it might have been impossible to climb along the full length of the captured ship and reach the aft end. But Dwer took advantage of conditions as he found them, and soon taught himself to fly.