I need you. Simple words, but they cut deep and made Shareem feel like crying. Her arms ached to hold her daughter as they’d ached before. More than once she’d taken her ship cautiously into the mess around Jaydugar and hovered watching the world turn under her, had seen it frozen in the depths of winter, burning in the long, long summer, yet she’d never dared land and claim her daughter. So many reasons for not doing what she half wanted, half feared to do. And all of those reasons seemed empty now, as foolish as her urge to take a grown woman into her arms as if she were a hurting child, rock her, soothe her, tell her mother would make things right. Absurd, of course, and too painful to dwell, on, so she pushed the thought aside.

  “Help? Of course I’ll help. When he knows we’ve met, which will be soon, I’ll be a target too.” She looked down at her hands, opened and closed them, ran her thumb over her wrist where scars would have been except for Kell’s autodoc; her stomach knotted and her throat closed up as she brought up buried memories she’d never been able to wipe away, memories that surfaced in dreams though she’d never let them up in the daytime.

  “Lee …” Her throat closed again; she swallowed and forced herself to a measure of calm—what else was time useful for but to teach you how to deal with your crises? “Lee, I don’t know how much use I’d be if this thing gets sticky. He’s got a—I don’t know what to call it—if he gets close enough to me, I’ll do just about anything he tells me no matter how I hate it. When I was very young, a child really … just out of basic training, ready to fight the world … you know—no, maybe you don’t—I … he got hold of me and took me into his dome. He was young too, same generation, born about a hundred years before I was. And he’d just found out about the sterility thing. It was a shock; he should have learned it before when he was younger and more flexible, but the way chance turned, he didn’t. Too bad. And too bad he learned it in the way he did, in bed with one of the more unstable Vryhh, a second-generation bitch named Nallis.

  “Where was I? I was as foolish as I was young. He was healthy and handsome and had charm coming out his ears when he wanted to use it.” She looked up, pushed the hair out of her eyes, a smile for her daughter, filled with wry recognition of the difference in their experience. “You wouldn’t know about that—I don’t blame you, Lee, if you don’t believe me, but …” She spread her hands, clasped them together. “It’s hard to tell you what I saw … all the things that make up what we call brilliance. He shone for me, glowed, burned, I can’t find the right word, Lee … and a vulnerability, an agony inside I could make him forget; I didn’t understand, and maybe that was what he needed. We played over the face of Vrithian, running with the sun, with the moons, seven-league boots on our feet, wings …. It could have been different if I’d known what was wrong with him, but if I had … I don’t know … I didn’t know how to help him later.

  “My mother warned me not to go with him the time he came to take me to his dome, but I wouldn’t listen. She said no one can help you there. I still wouldn’t listen. Years had ‘slid by while we were playing. I think you don’t know what it’s like, being young and knowing you have immense stretches of time ahead, there is no hurry for anything, you savor things, make them last, they have to last. Years slid by and he was changing but I didn’t see it; there were long intervals when I didn’t see him at all. Then he came for me.” She dug around, found a crumpled old tissue and mopped at her face, sat tearing it into shreds as she went on.

  “I found out what he was doing when he wasn’t with me. Found out fast and hard. He had herds of women in that dome, Vrithli, even reptiloid females, though I don’t know what he expected from them. Women of all sorts from outside the cloud, it was like a zoo in there, yes in more ways than one; he kept them in cages of a sort. Some he lay with, some he just used in experiments. I suppose he thought he might find some miraculous conjunction that would make him whole, yes, whole; he saw himself as maimed, deformed. Nothing I said or did ever changed that, even after I finally understood what was happening to him. I tried to leave … wanted no part of that mess. He wouldn’t let me go. He’d sired no children on any of the women there, Warned them, either they were barren or tricking him or sabotaging his experiments … how they could do that was something I never understood, because they were confined to those small cells, but he was beyond being rational about it by then.

  “All the time I was there he watched me, had spy eyes on me when he was somewhere else, made me watch the tapes and tell him everything I was thinking. Sometimes he couldn’t get it up with me, then he’d beat me … on the body where it wouldn’t show. He was always careful before visitors … none of them saw the women … made me reassure my mother … pretend I was content … still in love with him, healthy, happy. More than once he almost killed me … ruptured spleen, internal bleeding, you name it … wouldn’t let me die, though I’d have been glad to by then … shoved me in the autodoc … toward the end I was deliberately driving him into rages … either he’d kill me and I’d be free of his torment or he’d injure me enough he had to put in the autodoc … addicted me to that machine.”

  She passed her thumb over her wrist again, sighed. “Finally I looked so bad he wouldn’t let anyone see me … told everyone I was pregnant … by him, of course … having a hard time … prone to miscarriage, so he didn’t want me bothered. My mother didn’t believe him, but she couldn’t do anything until she figured a way into his dome past his defenses. She got Hyaroll to tease Kell away for a few hours … got to me … got me to open for her … got me out … she and Hyaroll, she told me he was my father, but he never said anything. They put my head together again … though the seams show if you know where to look … and when they were done with that, I started running. Been running ever since. I couldn’t bring you to Vrithian … not a baby … you have to see that. I wish you’d killed him when you had the chance, Lee. You should have killed him.”

  Aleytys came out of her chair with an urgent suddenness that startled Shareem, knelt beside her, put a hand on her

  arm. “Forget what I said, Reem, just get me to Vrithian. Then you take off, scoot as far away as you can.”

  Shareem blinked. “Seven hundred years.” She patted her daughter’s hand with absentminded affection. “A long time to run. But I had a lot to run from. He didn’t give up on me, not even then. I wouldn’t go back to the dome, but … anything else, all he had to do was whistle and I’d come … nice little bitch, trained to heel. By that time he didn’t really want me, just … he killed my mother, destroyed everything she was fond of … but me … lay back for years, apparently resigned to defeat … then he went to the Mesochthon, registered a death challenge … next day he … he meant to get us both, I think, but Hyaroll … he discovered something … I don’t remember much about that time … something about collapsed matter, I think … I don’t know … he wanted Mother to come and help him celebrate, she was always his favorite Vryhh, he was fond of me too … in his way … Mother … one of her damakin was about to foal, that was what she was playing with then, she liked working with animals, this one was so gentle and trusting it was near extinct on its home world, this damakin was about to foal and having a hard time so she wouldn’t come … and I went instead of her … and Kell got a bomb through her defenses somehow, turned everything to slag.”

  She lifted Aleytys’s hand, held it briefly against her cheek, put it with gentle precision on the chair arm. “How could he get away with something like that? We Vrya never acknowledged the right of anyone to judge our acts; we’re all sovereign nations, Lee, with a population of one. Nations declare war on each other, don’t they? We call our wars death duels. Kell did all the proper things, he issued a formal challenge at the Mesochthon, then killed my mother. Too bad, but she wasn’t lucky or smart enough. Anyone who thought different could challenge him. But there was no one. Hyaroll wouldn’t, and I’d rather have jumped into the sun naked. I think Hyaroll must have said something to him, though, because after that he more or less left me alone. Oh, he’d play … sick games with me, mock at me … after a while he got bored with baiting me and left me alone … until I came to Vrithian with news of a daughter, something he took as a personal affront. Do you understand a bit more what’s waiting for you? Lee, what I’m trying to say …”

  “I know.” Aleytys got to her feet, went to stand with her hands gripping the mantel, her eyes on the floor, her back to Shareem. “I think you underestimate yourself,” she said quietly. “I think you’re a lot tougher than you know. But what’s the point trying to prove anything like that? Reem, I can’t find Vrithian without you, there’s no getting around that, but once I’m there … well, there’s no real reason for you to stay.”

  “Lee …”

  “I mean it.”

  “I know, but don’t you think abandoning you once is enough?”

  “You won’t be abandoning me. Don’t be absurd, Reem. I’m a grown woman; I’ve been taking care of myself for years in some very tricky situations.”

  “Yes, I hear you. Please hear me, daughter. Please, I’m done with rationalizing my failures. I can’t do it anymore.” She forced a chuckle that quickly turned real as her sense of the ridiculous woke from its coma. “Stop mothering me, Lee. Don’t you feel a little silly trying to protect a nine-hundred-year-old baby from her better impulses?”

  Aleytys swung around, set her shoulders against the bricks. “Habits. You make them without thought and spend years thinking how to break them.” She closed her eyes. “I hate this, Reem. I loathe it. Hunting a man down, killing him. While he lies helpless looking up at you … me … eyes filled with terror and resignation. Ay-Madar, why can’t I heal crooked minds? Oh yes, I’ve killed men and beasts before. With my hands, with my fire, with weapons of one kind and another. And felt them die. Felt their fear and pain and urgency and the nothing that’s suddenly there. I can block some of that. When I’m fighting for my life, I’m too … concentrated … too busy … to feel—no, mat’s not quite right, feeling’s shunted aside, I shut off the meaning of it. But slaughtering a helpless man … you said I should have killed him before … you were right in a way … I would have saved a lot of misery … my baby … Grey … Ticutt, who’s my friend … you were right, I should have killed him. I couldn’t, Reem, I couldn’t make myself do it. If the same thing comes up again, I don’t know ….”

  “If you want an honest answer. Lee, I have to tell you I don’t understand a word of all that. Kell’s not a man anymore, he’s a thing; he should be grateful to you for ending him.”

  Aleytys drew the back of her hand across her eyes, pushed at the hair by her face, tucked it behind her ears, looked at her hand, let it fall. “A thing. “No.” She slapped her hand against the bricks. “No! I can’t start thinking like that.” Her arms held straight out before her, she turned her palms up. Her face went quiet and remote, but held no hint of effort, or none Shareem could see. Tongues of flame hotter than the fire behind her shot up from the hollows of her palms, swayed and shimmered for a short time, then sank back into her daughter’s flesh. “If I start thinking like that, I’ll soon be no better or saner than Kell. No. I’ll do this thing. He’s left me no choice. Better or saner than Kell. No. I’ll do this thing. He’s left me no choice. But not gladly. And I won’t let myself forget that what I’m Hunting is a man, a wanting feeling intelligence.” She rubbed her hands along the bricks, frowning at nothing, looking past Shareem at something only she could see.

  Shareem sat silent. There was nothing she could say. She found her daughter’s scruples absurd; as far as she could see they were self-inflicted miseries Aleytys would do better without. She’d made her mild protest; look what that had brought. Anything more and she could drive her daughter away.

  Aleytys dropped her gaze, smiled suddenly. “You kept truth at arm’s length most of the time you were on Jaydugar, didn’t you? And that letter, ah, that lovely misleading letter,”

  “You know my reasons.” A small protest Shareem couldn’t help making.

  “The truth shall make you free.” Aleytys spoke softly, sadly. “It doesn’t always, does it?” She slid down until she was sitting on the hearth, legs crossed, back against the warm bricks. “But I prefer truth when it won’t kill me outright. Makes life just a little simpler. And being able to tell the truth—with a small t, Reem, always a small t—that’s so … so … I don’t know … so comfortable. No straining the brain to pretend I am what I’m not, what you see is what you get, like it or no.”

  “No doubt.”

  Aleytys laughed, unfolded with a bounce, stretched her arms over her head, snapped them down. “I’m hungry. You want some Wolfflan food?”

  “What’s that?”

  “Mostly meat and pastries, sweet glazes on the vegetables. But there’s a place I know where the chef is accommodating and will spare the sauces and singe a steak to your taste. I’m not much on domesticity—Grey did all the cooking whence was home.” She went still, her face blanked, then she shook herself and stepped away from the fireplace. “So you see, if you’re hungry, it’s eat out or go back to your ship, or, I don’t know, not exactly polite to work a guest, but the kitchen’s yours if you want.”

  “No autochef? Me in the kitchen on my own—that would be a disaster.” Shareem tried for a light tone, something to lessen the squeeze on her heart as she saw her daughter grieving. “On Vrithian—and on my ship, I’ll have you know—androids take care of that sort of thing. We’ll try your accommodating chef. I’m sure I’ve eaten and enjoyed meals a lot stranger than his.”

  Aleytys nodded, started for the door. Over her shoulder she said, “You know where the fresher is if you want a wash or anything. I’ll be rounding up Shadith and Linfyar.” She saw Shareem’s grimace and grinned. “He has private rooms, Reem—we won’t be putting on a show for the public. What public there is.” With a wave of her hand she vanished into the hall; Shareem listened to the diminishing clicks of her bootheels, leaned back in her chair and rubbed at her forehead. Exhausting, this meeting a daughter she knew only from record flakes and rumor. She had a feeling she was going to be worn to a nub before this thing was over.

  Aleytys sat in Head’s office in the chair where she’d been presented with so many reluctantly offered and accepted ultimatums. She smiled at Canyli Heldeen. “I expect to be back,” she said. “This is only a leave of absence.” She scrawled her signature on the sheet and passed it across to Head, took a sealed envelope from her shoulder bag, skimmed it after the leave agreement. “These are the papers leasing my ship to Shadith for three years, a drach a year. No use letting it sit around collecting dust and dock fees. At the end of three years, if I haven’t returned to claim it, the ship’s to be transferred to her name.”

  “There could be problems about that, Lee—she’s a child.”

  “Hardly.”

  “Nonetheless, the way she looks is going to make trouble for her.”

  Aleytys rubbed at her eyes. “She’ll just have to deal with that, Nyl. If it comes up. To tell you the truth, I wouldn’t want to make anyone responsible for her actions—she’s too likely to do something off the wall just for the holy hell of it and embarrass me and her guardian too.” She shrugged. “If you run into problems with her looks, say her species matures … no, better let Shadow handle that and you just stare down anyone who objects.” She settled back into the chair, sat with her hands resting lightly on the arms. “Deed to my house and land, that’s in there too. If I don’t come back in three years, or you don’t hear from me, house and land are yours, your personal property.”

  “Lee.”

  “I said if.” She chuckled. “Not a very big if, my friend. When are you sending Taggert off?”

  “Three days after you leave.”

  “Good. Shadith’s off tonight. She’ll have time to worm herself into cover before he arrives. Is he going straight in like the others?”

  “No.”

  “Ah. Clever man. I won’t ask more.” She got to her feet.

  Canyli Heldeen came around the desk, hugged Aleytys vigorously, then walked with her through the outer offices and went down the lift shaft with her, all this in a companionable silence. She knew what Aleytys wouldn’t say aloud—that at the end of those three years there was a very good chance she would own a house and horses, Shadith would own a ship. In the roofed flitter yard, Canyli put her hand on Aleytys’s shoulder. “Take care,” she said, then she turned and walked briskly toward the lift shaft, a square sturdy woman with her mind already turning to a dozen more urgent problems.

  “Right,” Aleytys said. She ran a hand through her hair, tried to push away the thought that she wasn’t ready for anything, then she got into the flitter, eased it out of the yard and started home, going over everything that had to be done before she left, a very short list, half a dozen items; she tried to think of anything she’d forgotten, but couldn’t dredge up a thing, everything turned off that had to be turned off, the “girl who tended the livestock warned she’d be in charge starting tomorrow and she should call Head in any emergency, the loans finalized, credit in the bank with Canyli deputized to handle it, gear packed and waiting. She looked out at the empty landscape passing below her, bleak but with an austere beauty she appreciated more each year. “Tomorrow. The Dance begins tomorrow.”

  gameboard (first of two)

  VRITHIAN IN THE MISTS

  Second of five planets orbiting the star AVENAR which exists in a slowly enlarging cavity within a cloud of faintly glowing gases and dust DAY: 28.003 hours-standard YEAR: 585.001 days

  Oblate spheroid, mean diameter 12,892 km Density 5.72 times that of water Rotational axis tilted 24°