"Just making sure you're safe."

  "By tying me to the rail? No, Earl, I won't let you do it. I want to be free to move if I want." She rose, hands lifting, weaving to illustrate. "To sing and dance. Will you dance with me, darling? Hold me close and force me to move to your rhythm? The wind will be our music, Earl. Listen to it. Listen!"

  Pay attention to the gusts, the sudden flurries which came like padded hammers to stir hair and sting the eyes. The blasts which attacked the raft as if it were an enemy to be replaced by soothing breezes droning a lullaby.

  Hot air, rising, caught and diverted by the hills, merging with that from the sea, the draught from the natural funnel of the valley. It was no mystery why the colors swirled in such elaborate confusion.

  "Down!" Dumarest sensed the danger. "Damn you, man, get us down!"

  "Why? Because of a little wind? Hell, man, this is fun."

  "Do it!" Dumarest spun as Selina caught at his arm. "Order him down, girl. Down!"

  She laughed in his face. "Stop worrying, Earl." Her arm lifted, long fingers pointing. "See?"

  Amber spurted from a ruptured sac, rising to form an obscene shape in the sky, changing to depict a mansion, an octopus, a cowled and enigmatic figure. Lavender joined it followed by a stream of puce. Looking over the edge of the raft Dumarest saw the ground below dotted with taut membranes. "Away, Boyce! Away!"

  He was too late. Even as he shouted the order the membrane below split with the report of a gun and, suddenly, they were enveloped in an olive darkness. One which was alive. One which could kill.

  "Earl!"

  Selina screamed as the ephemerae enveloped her, covering her face, her eyes, resting thickly on her hair, replaced by others as she swept them away with her hands. Winged bodies inches long, goggle-eyed, spined, spindle-legged, churning, swirling, locked in the mating frenzy. Individually they were harmless but as a mass they blinded, hampered, blocked the passage of air to the lungs, stopped ears, filled nostrils.

  And the weight of them threatened the stability of the raft.

  Dumarest felt it tilt as he grabbed at the girl, one hand gripping her wrist while the other kept his eyes clear of the swarm. Boyce was shouting, arms lifted, waving, a darker patch in the living darkness. One which slipped and fell against the controls.

  Dumarest grabbed at the rail as the raft fell from beneath him, hanging, supported by one hand, the other clamped on Selina who dangled beneath him. A tearing weight which threatened his grip as the ephemerae closed in a ball about his head. He felt the scratch and tear of legs against his face; spindle-limbs which hooked the skin of lips and cheeks and fretted at the lids of his tightly closed eyes. The urgent thrust of abdomens bruised and coated with vented seed. It was impossible to breathe. A dragging moment of nightmare in which he hung helpless then, shifted by a vagrant gust of wind, the raft leveled, rising so as to support his weight.

  "Earl!" The gust had cleared his ears. "Earl, help me!"

  He heaved, dragging her body up and alongside his own, lifting her hand to the rail, releasing it when her fingers took hold. With his freed hand he swept the crawling bodies from his mouth and sucked air into his burning lungs. Only when he'd oxygenated his blood did he clear his eyes and look around.

  Selina was beside him, eyes tightly closed beneath a scatter of ephemerae. They opened when he passed his hand over her face. The creatures had thinned now, the olive darkness replaced by a dull, emerald sheen which lightened even as he watched. The swarm, dissipating, riding the winds, expanding like smoke to streak the heavens with fading color.

  Boyce had gone; thrown out when the raft had tilted and now lying dead and broken on the rocks below. Selina called out as Dumarest edged his way toward the vacant controls.

  "Earl! Don't leave me!"

  "Stay where you are and hang on tight."

  Dumarest brushed ephemerae from his face. Beneath him the raft tilted again, veering, dropping to spin in a fluttering circle as if it had been a leaf blown from a tree. A descent which would smash both the craft and its occupants if unchecked. Dumarest increased his pace and reached the controls just as a fresh cloud of ephemerae closed about the machine.

  A moment in which he was deafened, blinded, locked in a world of distorted movement. One which passed almost as quickly as it had come, leaving him fighting to maintain the stability of the raft, to set it down with a wrenching crash on jagged stones. A successful landing—he could walk away. But Selina was dying.

  She lay two hundred yards from the wreck of the raft, a pale splotch against the ochre ground, her hair spread to form a curtain about her head. At first she seemed unharmed then Dumarest saw the unnatural angle of a leg, the rim of blood edging her lips, the dark mottling of ugly bruises on her side.

  "Earl!" A hand lifted toward him as he headed to where she lay. "Earl, my darling—it hurts!"

  The pain of torn muscle, wrenched sinews, broken bones and ruptured internal organs. Agony which would increase as the initial shock lessened. Gently he examined her, hearing the hiss of indrawn breath as he straightened the broken leg. The spleen, he guessed, certainly a kidney, and the back could be broken as was the collarbone. Injuries which could be cured given the right treatment but the raft was bereft of any emergency medical supplies and how to summon aid? And even if she could be moved to the house what then? Jarvis had no money and the surgery she needed would be expensive.

  "Earl?" She looked at him as if guessing his thoughts. "Is it bad?"

  "No."

  "You're lying. I can't move my legs and my side is numb. It hurts when I breathe and I feel sick." She drew in her breath. "Damn!"

  "There's nothing I can give you," he said. "The raft—"

  "I know."

  "If Boyce had done his job—"

  "He's dead," she said. "And it wasn't really his fault. I should have hung on as you told me to but I freed a hand to wipe my face and the other slipped. It seemed a long way to fall."

  A matter of a couple of hundred feet at the most, probably much less, but it had been enough. The rocks waiting to impact her body hadn't been gentle. Dumarest reached forward to wipe her face. She was sweating and blood seeped from between her lips. He could imagine her pain.

  "Manna," she said. "Earl, get me some manna."

  "What?"

  "There." Her hand lifted, pointing. "Among the rocks. You'll see its shine. Hurry, Earl, please."

  The sun was high and he turned her face before rising to search. The winds had dusted the ground and formed little dunes at the bases of jumbled rocks. Some of them shone with a crystal glitter and he knelt to gather the harvest; the empty bodies of male ephemerae, voided by their mating, dried by sun and wind, losing all color to gleam as if made of glass. They stirred as he blew away the dust, crumpled as he closed his fingers around them.

  "Earl!" Selina was weakening, a victim of rising agony. "Hurry, Earl!"

  His shadow fell over her face as he rejoined her, kneeling to put one hand beneath her head, lifting as he held the cupped palm of the other to her lips. Eagerly she tongued the small heap of substance into her mouth. A moment then, incredibly, she laughed.

  "Wasn't it fun, Earl? I've never had a ride like it before. To go right into the color—fantastic!"

  He said nothing, lifting the hair from her forehead, keeping the sun from her eyes.

  "You look sad, my darling, but there's no need." Her hand moved to touch his own. "There's nothing to worry about. A few years—what am I losing? At least now I'll never grow old and ugly. In fact I'm looking forward to what is to come. Maybe we'll meet again, Earl. Go riding into more colors." She yawned. "God, I'm tired! I think I'll take a nap now. You'll stay with me, darling?"

  "I'll stay."

  A promise he kept until there was no further need.

  Rising he looked down at the dead girl. Despite the blood her face was peaceful, the eyes closed, even the mouth seeming as if she smiled. Against the ochre sand her hair gleamed with the richness of oiled silk. Even as he watched an ephemera, a gravid female, scuttled from the loom of a rock to quest at its edge in search of a nesting site. It darted away from the moving shadow of his hand. Moved again as a second shadow came to rest beside his own.

  "Earl!" Isobel Boulaye stood a few feet away, a half-loaded raft resting behind her. "I didn't know it was you. I saw your raft and came in search." Her eyes moved to the girl. "Dead?"

  "Yes."

  "Don't feel bad about it. There was nothing you could have done."

  Nothing but to kill her with painless mercy, but the manna had taken care of that. Dumarest looked at the flecks clinging to his palm, remembering what Anna had given Estelle, the flitters he had drunk in wine. Lifting his hand he tongued the shining powder and tasted a familiar sweetness. Not a poison then, but what?

  "A curse." The woman had been watching him. "The blight of this world, Earl. Most can't live without it, a few leave it alone, some are able to reject it. You could be one of them."

  "And you?"

  "I leave it alone. Did she?"

  "No."

  "A pity. She was so beautiful. Were you lovers?"

  Dumarest looked at her knowing it was kinder to lie. "No."

  "Earl—"

  "We were friends," he said harshly. "We ran and swam and played games together. The last one killed her." He glanced to where her raft was standing. "If you have something to wrap around her and will give me transportation I'll take her back to her people." He frowned as she shook her head. "You refuse?"

  "There are customs, Earl. On Elysius the dead lie where they fall and they do not lie for long. You understand?"

  Predators, creatures which lurked beneath the sand, scavengers who lived on the dead—such were common on many worlds. Even the custom held merit—a return of sustenance to the land, but on this world it could hold a deeper significance. In the rising clouds of ephemerae she would live again. He wondered what color she would be.

  Chapter Nine

  Anna was busy in the foyer when Dumarest entered the Argive House. "Earl! It's good to see you!" Her lips pursed as she studied his soiled clothing, bright metal gleaming through rips in the plastic. "Man, you look a mess! What did they do to you?" She shook her head when he'd told her. "That poor girl. What about you? From the look of it you need a hot bath and a massage."

  Things offered by Isobel which he'd refused. "Where's Zalman?"

  "Hans? He's out somewhere, but never mind about him. Get into the bath and leave your clothes outside." She turned, shouting, "Celia! Stoke up the boiler!" Then, to Dumarest. "Don't be a fool, Earl. Zalman can wait."

  The water was steaming and Dumarest sank into it, conscious of aches and bruises from his legs, hips, and shoulder. The legs had taken the impact of the landing, transmitted shock jarring the tissues of the hips. He'd rolled when the raft had hit, slamming his shoulder hard against a rock, lucky not to have cracked his skull. The protective mesh buried in his garments had saved him from lacerations but the bone had been bruised.

  He moved in the water, adding more hot to that inside the tub, leaning back and inhaling the moist vapor. Luck, again it had saved him, but for how much longer?

  "Earl? Where are your clothes?"

  He'd forgotten and watched as Celia came into the bathroom to collect them. She turned at the door, smiling, losing the smile, as her mother yelled to her again. Alone Dumarest laved his body, washed off the suds, and refilled the tub with fresh, near-boiling water. Heat which eased the aches and would bring out the bruises. Anna was waiting for him in the bedroom when he finally left the tub.

  "Sit." She gestured to his bed. "And you can get rid of that towel. I've nursed enough men to know what they're like."

  He sat, retaining the towel, looking at the woman and what she had brought with her. She had rolled her sleeves to the elbows and had set a bottle of oil on the table beside the bed. As he settled she handed him a goblet full of steaming liquid.

  "Tisane," she explained. "Herbs steeped in boiling water and with a couple of extra ingredients to help. It'll relax you and bring sleep." Then, as he hesitated, she added, "There's no manna in it, that I swear. I don't use the stuff. I saw what it did to the man who owned this place, my parents, too many others. Drink up, Earl, and let me work on those bruises."

  He drank and stretched on the bed, feeling the towel fall away as, palms filled with oil, the woman set about massaging his body. She was skilled, strong fingers probing, following the line of muscle and sinew, easing, relieving tensions and dispersing nodes of discomfort. At her command he turned and lay face down, one cheek against the pillow, eyes closed, feeling himself drift as the tisane took effect.

  Reliving the events of the past few days, the laughing pleasure he had known with Selina, the last ride, the fall.

  Why had he been so careless?

  The manna had been to blame; the saccharin sweetness culled from the dead ephemerae robbing him of all sense of urgency. It had turned the days into a succession of pleasant interludes in which time had no meaning. He saw Selina's face again, heard her laughter, her utter indifference to death. An armor won after he had fed her the crystal glitters.

  A curse, Isobel had called it. The blight of this world, but it could not always have been that. The houses had been built to last, the town, the settlement as a whole.

  One more fortunate than most for the manna would have provided a food rich in protein, easily gathered and easily stored. A guarantee of personal freedom for every man, woman, and child. Together with the mild climate it would have been enough to have eliminated the more savage aspects of survival. There would have been time for pursuing the arts, personal relationships, the enjoyment of pleasure. Then the world would have been blessed with happiness.

  But something had happened. When?

  Dumarest turned, easing his bruises. Anna had said she'd arrived on Elysius when young—forty years ago at the most. The dilapidation of the houses could have taken that long. The erosion of morale would have been faster but say forty years. It would have started slowly, insidiously; a subtle mutation of the ephemerae which changed the manna from a harmless, slightly invigorating food into something far more complex. Something which quelled natural caution, gave a lasting euphoria, changed the perspective and altered the appreciation of time. A window needs to be repaired? I'll do it tomorrow. A door to be put back on its hinges—tomorrow. An electronic circuit to be fixed—tomorrow. Tomorrow, always tomorrow, a tomorrow which never came.

  He turned again and saw Selina smiling at him, the blood on her mouth the ruby of crushed roses, the mane of her hair the limitless ocean of space, the glitter of dead bodies, the stars which shone like lanterns in the empty dark.

  Stars which were suns accompanied by worlds of endless variety.

  Which of them all was the one he sought?

  A lonely world far out to the rim, one circled by a great silver moon, a planet scarred and torn by ancient cataclysms. The planet of his birth and the only home he could ever know. Finding it was the reason for his existence.

  In sleep he was there again, small, cold, huddled against a rock, watching the ship which had landed, its strange markings bright in the wash of moonlight. An open hatch and the desperation which drove him toward it. Darkness and a place in which he had hid. The hum and sense of movement and, after a long while, the discovery when he had ventured out to search for food.

  Like water shivered in a pool, images passed before him; the captain's face, the ship, the fear, the sick knowledge of what could happen, the stars which shone hungrily waiting for him to be evicted. And then other worlds, long journeys leading always toward the heart of the galaxy. New captains, new ships, fresh worlds as he grew and became a man. A lifetime compressed into whirling depictions but, always, remained his need to find Earth.

  Tomorrow—he would find it tomorrow.

  It was dusk when he woke and he lay like an animal, conscious that he was not alone. Zalman stood beside the bed, stooped over the cleaned and refurbished clothing heaped on a chair. He straightened as Dumarest watched to look through the window. The light made him look old and tense; a man unsure of himself, one afraid.

  "Hans?"

  "You're awake!" He spun, smiling. "I'm glad you're back, Earl. Anna told me what happened. I brought up your clothes." He gestured toward them. "She did a good job. God, man, you could have been killed!"

  "Why didn't you warn me?"

  "About the manna?" Zalman made no effort to pretend he didn't understand. "I didn't know, Earl. I just didn't know."

  The stuff had rotted the world for decades—how could he have been ignorant?

  "Please!" Zalman had read Dumarest's anger, his disbelief. "I've never been here before, Earl. Don't you understand? I'm as much a stranger as you are. No!" He backed, one hand lifting as Dumarest rose from the bed. "I'm not lying, Earl!"

  "You told me you knew someone. A man here on Elysius!"

  "That's true but, Earl, never did I tell you I'd ever been here."

  "You told Julie she would be wasting her time opening a house."

  "That was also true—but I was working on information I'd gathered. The gambler knew her intentions and thought her a fool. The steward—it was like reading a warning notice."

  "The manna?"

  "Nothing, Earl, I swear it. By the time I'd learned of the danger you'd left with Estelle. I tried to contact you but no one at the house bothered to answer."

  A possibility—the Hausi could have a special method of gaining attention, and now the matter was of no importance. But the reason he had come to Elysius still remained.

  Dumarest said, "The man you swore knew of Earth. Where is he?"

  "Earl, I didn't lie. I met him before he came here and he had the answer. It meant nothing to me then, just an odd item of information, but he had it, of that I'm certain." He added, "It was on Ascelius when—"

  "Ascelius! His name?"

  He knew it before Zalman told him and felt again the old, familiar pain. Too late—must he always be too late? Rudi Boulaye was dead, buried in the hills—had his secret died with him?