The kassie cooks were conferring in the far corner. They looked up at me with their saucer-sized, violet eyes. Mim mixed something in a bowl with abrupt, violent movements of her arms. When I asked for Laur, she pointed her chin at the far door, and I went into the kitchen garden. Laur sat amid the rows of seedlings, her hands in her lap and her head bowed.

"Laur?"

The old woman looked at me, then scrambled to her feet and plastered a false smile across her face.

"You shouldn't be outside," she said, "not dressed like that. Go indoors."

"What's wrong?" I demanded.

She looked surprised. "Nothing's wrong. Whatever gave you that idea?

You get inside now, before the whole village sees you wandering around in your nightdress. Go on, get yourself inside."

I waited motionless as another contraction came and went, while Laur tugged at my arm. She looked miserable, and a dread built up inside me.

"It's Jason, isn't it?" I said. "You'd better tell me, Laur. Has something happened to Jason?"

"Jason?" she repeated. "Bless your heart, of course not. Oh, did I scare you? No, no, Quia Jason's fine, wherever he is. Of course it's not Jason. Come on, let's go inside."

"Yes, it is," I said. My knees felt weak. "You're trying to hide it from me. Tell me what's happened to Jason!"

"Hush now, hush. Jason's fine. It's not Jason." Laur bit on her lip a moment as I stared at her with disbelief. "It's Tabor," she said. "He's going away."

The immediate relief was followed by dismay. "Oh, Laur, he can't be, not now. Where is he? I'll talk to him. He can't leave now."

"He's in his room. I don't know what I'll do without him. There's so much to get done."

I turned toward the house. Laur caught up with me in the kitchen and grabbed my arm. I stopped, but only to let another contraction build and fade.

They seemed to be increasing in strength rapidly.

"You can't go up to his room," Laur babbled. "Even to think of such a thing! What would Jason say? You wait right by the stairs, Quia Mish, until he comes down. His room! That wouldn't do at all!"

I shrugged her off and climbed the stairs while Laur stood wringing her hands and calling on Mim for aid. I pushed open Tabor's door without knocking.

He stood by the bed, folding his clothes into his pack. His flute was tucked under his belt. I leaned against the doorframe and stared at him. He looked at me, then pressed the pack closed and sat on the bed, sighing.

"I told them not to tell you," he said, "not until I had left." I didn't reply. "You've been very kind to let me stay on as long as I have."

This with great formality. "But I'm well enough to travel now, and I think it's time to be going."

"That's absurd," I said. "You know you've been welcome. You helped us when we needed all the help we could get. You worked for your welcome, so don't give me this crap about leaving. Besides, where would you go?"

"Cault Tereth," he said.

"The mountains? They're still covered with snow. There're no fields there. That's no place to live."

"Still, that's where I'm going."

I shook my head and sat in the room's one chair.

"Please, Tabor, be reasonable. Jason won't be back until the Mother only knows when, and I'm going to be out of commission for a while. We need you here. I don't think we could have made it without you."

I stopped for another contraction, was stronger than the others. I was silent and Tabor, staring out the window, did not notice.

"I'm sorry," he said, "but I'm not going to change my mind."

I lost my temper. "No, I'd imagine that you're not," I said. "We took you in and helped you when you needed it, and now that you're well enough you'll just go running out when we need some help in return. You and your damned flute! You're exactly like the rest of them, always taking and never willing to give anything at all!"

"Mish," he pleaded.

"Well, go, then, and to hell with you. We can get along without you very well. We did before you came, and we can do it again." By now I was crying. My back ached from sitting in the chair. He squatted beside me and held my hand, and I clenched his. Another pain. I turned my head away and fought the contraction, and, of course, it only hurt worse.

"Mish, listen," Tabor was saying, "it's not fair, not to you and not to Jason. Listen to me. If I could think of a way to stay with you, I'd do it, I swear I'd do it. But I can't. I don't want to leave you, ever, but I have to go. Mish? I love you."

"Me?" I said.

He bent his head to my belly and kissed it.

"Can you see that it's not fair for me to stay? It would only make trouble, make me unhappy and you unhappy, and it's a terrible thing to do to Jason. I've got to go now, before I can't go at all. Do you understand?"

I didn't. All I understood was that he said he loved me, yet he was leaving me just when I needed him most, as Jason had left me, and that I was to be alone again. I stared at him with silent misery. He rose, grabbed his pack, clutched his cane, and stumped toward the door. The flute gleamed from his waist. I called his name. He stopped at the door, his back to me, and waited. He seemed as vulnerable as one of the children, and the urge to hurt him disappeared.

"When you reach Haven, send Hoku up." The words seemed very clear and distant to me. "The baby's coming."

He made a small, helpless gesture and almost turned around. Then he was gone down the stairs, and I listened to the sound of his cane in the yard until another contraction took me. This time I screamed.

The labor was short and easy. By early evening Hoku handed me my child and pressed on my stomach to empty out the afterbirth. I looked at this new daughter and saw in her a winter of misery and a spring of pain. I handed her to Laur and turned my head away.

When they asked, I told them to call her Meya and to find a nurse from the village for her. Jason came home two days later, apologetic for his tardiness and pleased with his daughter. She lay in his arms, staring at him from enormous dark eyes set in a tiny, oval face, while he dandled her and cooed and made a cheerful fool of himself. I sat apart from them, looking through the window toward the south. The mountains were visible as a smudge of purple against a light spring sky, and the wind in the kaedos made a noise like that of flutes.

*Part Two*

*1219*

*New Time*

*The*

*Death*

*Of*

*Delta-Three*

'"Prepare the zappers, Contestor. There are some things which have to be done."'

'-Tri-Captain Delta-Three'

JES CREPT CLOSER TO THE DOOR AND LISTened, holding his breath. The hallway was warm and dark, illuminated only by the thread of light which slid beneath the closed doors of the living room.

"Hell, Manny, you said they were too busy killing themselves to bother with us." Jason's voice was rough with worry.

"I was wrong. They're crazier than I thought. Some of them are talking about evacuating, finally, but they're not planning to take everyone, just the uppers. And they want to come here. Take the place over. They've got maps, scans -- they figure if you're all here on To'an Cault, well, there're plenty of other islands. They'd just slag Cault and colonize elsewhere on Aerie."

Hetch coughed. "You know I don't scare easy. I wouldn't have brought the news if I didn't think they were serious."

"I believe you," Mish said. Her voice was calm. Jes shivered and put his hands in his armpits. "The question remains: How are we going to stop them? We haven't got a ship of our own, no armaments, nothing. And the Federation -- "

"The Federation's not going to do shit," Hetch said. "Glorified regulatory agency, that's what it is, and as long as NewHome doesn't touch Federal communications or transport, they're not going to lift a finger. Even if they were willing to help, we couldn't bring them in. No, let me finish.

You tell them you're being invaded from NewHome, and NewHome tells them that it's a retaliatory strike, that you raided them three years ago. We did make the first move, you know."

"But they were killing people!" Jason yelled.

"And still are. That's not Federation business. You can run your own planet any damned way you want, all the Federation's concerned with is what you do off-planet. You raided NewHome, ran off with a bunch of citizens, killed some government employees, violated their system, made all kinds of trouble, without any provocation on their part. How's that going to look in a report to Althing Green? Besides, if you bring the Federation in on this, they're going to find out that you used my ship for the raid, and I'll lose my license. Hell, I'll lose everything I've got; you'll lose your contacts with Albion-Drake, might as well burn down your plantations, and NewHome'll take you over, anyway." Hetch snorted.

Jes heard the sounds of glass on glass, and the gurgle of liquid. He moved a bit closer to the doors and closed his eyes. The kaedo wood smelled warm and spicy, and made his nose itch.

"So if there's anything to be done, we do it ourselves," Mish said, "with no ships, no weapons, no army, and no help."

Jes wondered what his mother looked like as she said that. Small, calm, and golden, he thought. Her eyes would be steady, her face without expression -- as still as a figure in an old Oriental print. But his father's dark face would be darker with fury, and Captain Hetch would be rubbing his bald head as though trying to pull on the absent hair. The hallway felt colder.

"In about ten days?" Jason said.

"NewHome time. That's about seven days Aerie. I'm sorry, Jase. I came as soon as I knew, but -- "

"Forget it, Manny. Mish, we could evacuate Cault, hide out for the duration."

"What duration? They'd come in anyway, just take over the entire planet while we're hiding our heads. No."

"Maybe you've got a better idea?" Jason's voice was sarcastic.

"I don't know, Jase. But we can't let them walk in and take it over. We can't let it go."

"I can't even think anymore," Hetch said.

"Let's sleep on it. We're not going to get anything done tonight. Mish?

All right?"

Jes heard mumbled agreements as he ran up the stairs. When Mish came into his room for her usual check, he was bundled under the blankets, feigning sleep. She brushed his hair from his forehead, then closed the door behind her. He lay still, listening to doors closing and the padding of feet. When the house was silent, he rose and lit a lamp.

The news both frightened and excited him. He had been nine when Jason brought the refugees to Aerie, and in the excitement of their arrival had paid little attention to the stories of their trials and deaths. NewHome's star was pre-nova; that much he knew. NewHome's government, instead of evacuating the planet, had turned instead to bloodshed and plunder, raping their dying world in an orgy of greed and fear. That, at least, was how Simit, the teacher, put it, standing at the head of the class with his hands clenched and his scar white with tension. Hetch had come to Aerie with his news of NewHome's troubles, and Jason had gone back with the tubby captain to NewHome, had freed the entire population of one of Great Barrier's winter death camps, had brought two hundred fifty starving, distraught, terrified refugees back to Aerie, and given them a new and peaceful life. Jes remembered that the refugees had feared retaliation for their escape, but it had never materialized, and the fear was buried under all the incessant, important trivia of living. Now, though, NewHome had remembered them with malice. Now they would come.

Jes sat at the edge of his bed and let his fingers play over his flute.

He knew that Hetch had brought bad news when the captain had refused Jes the usual tour of his shuttle, but Jes forgave this now. He prowled his room for a while, then turned off the lamp, tucked the flute under his pillow, and lay back in his bed. If Aerie could not be defended on planet, it would have to be defended in space. Of course. Having reached that conclusion, Jes could not take the problem further. His eyes narrowed as he thought.

What would Tri-Captain Delta-Three do in a case like this? He closed his eyes.

The Tri-Captain spun her ship from the grab, zappers blazing as the NewHome fleet rushed toward her. She bent over the console, her fingers moving so fast that they blurred. The 'Tiger' rocked.

"Near miss, Captain," said Contestor Alta-Nine.

The Tri-Captain grinned and slagged the fleet's flagship. The rest of the fleet turned tail and ran toward NewHome.

"Shall we follow them, Captain?"

The Tri-Captain frowned. "I think so, Contestor. I don't like slagging entire planets, but this one is a danger to the Federation and everyone in it." The Tri-Captain squared her shoulders. "Prepare the zappers, Contestor.

There are some things which have to be done."

The Contestor saluted and ran from the bridge, while Tri-Captain Delta-Three raced her ship toward the enemy planet.

And if the Tri-Captain didn't have her ship? Or the zappers? Then what?

Well, she could fuse sand to make a huge mirror, and as the enemy ships came through the grab she'd focus Eagle's rays on them and...

Jes was still considering the problem when he fell asleep.

Breakfast the next morning was an uncomfortable affair. The adults made a great effort to be calm and casual, but to Jes every movement they made or sound they uttered was fraught with meaning. His young brother, Hart, ignored everyone, as usual, stuffing himself with cakes and milk and leaving the table as soon as he finished. Quilla, his older sister, bounced Meya on her lap and talked with Mish about the irrigation systems, her gaunt figure hunched in the chair, mop of frizzy hair framing her lean face. She looked tall and gangly beside their tiny, compact mother. Jes had heard the older children in Haven talk about Quilla as ugly, and although he slugged anyone he heard saying that, he suspected that they were right. Still, Quilla was Quilla. It didn't matter what she looked like. Jes thought that the Contestor Alta-Nine would look like Quilla, all brains and angles. That made him think of the Tri-Captain and NewHome again. What 'would' she do?

"Jes, you're going to be late for school," Mish said. Jes looked up, startled. "Come on, you've daydreamed long enough."

"I wasn't daydreaming," he said.

"I don't have time to argue. Now, get your pack and go on, and don't forget your lunch."

Jes pulled his shoulders back and stalked out of the room. He tucked the flute under his belt. Laur stood at the main door, holding his pack in one hand and a comb in the other.

"My hair's all right," he said, alarmed.

Laur looked skeptical and grabbed his shoulder. "Looks like a hayloft,"

she said. "Hold still. I'm not going to let people think that all Kennerins are wasters. There. And you remember to bring me some bread on your way home, hear? Go on, scoot!"

Jes ran down the hill, his scalp smarting. The roofs of Haven stretched below him, white and red and blue, each one supporting a spinning kite over its chimney. Airflowers popped in the grass, filling the warm sunlight with traces of sweetness. Jes checked to make sure Laur had gone inside, then slowed his pace. The kites twisted in the morning breeze, their lines turning gears turning axles turning rods turning generators, and the air above Haven remained clear and bright. Jason had invented the kites one summer when he'd noticed the smudge of burning wood smoke lying in the valley like a sleepy bird, and he had railed and ranted about the purity of his island until the Aerans avoided him on the streets and whispered behind his back, shaking their heads. What did Kennerin expect, if he said they didn't have the fremarks to buy a nuclear plant? Perhaps he wanted them to freeze in the winter, or depend on the inadequate solar sheeting. There were more than enough trees on To'an Cault for building and burning; besides, To'an Betes, across the strait, was almost entirely forest, a free warehouse just next door.

When Jason heard these mutterings, his face grew darker and his blue eyes glared. He locked himself in the barn for a week with Dene Beletes, the engineer, and when they emerged Dene carried a bright red kite, four meters wide, in her stubby hands. Within a month each house in Haven was equipped with its own kite, supplying enough power to supplement the solar sheeting.

Jes found the sight enchanting, and watched the bright colored shapes dancing above the village. One of these days a big wind would come up, he thought, and all the kites would go spinning into the clouds, carrying Haven along with them. A city in the air.

Simit, at the door of the schoolhouse, raised his horn to his lips and blew three shrill blasts. Jes cursed and ran through the village, arriving at the school just before Simit closed the doors.