"Walk faster and dream less."

"Yes, Quia Simit," Jes muttered and found his seat.

He couldn't concentrate. The room smelled of berry ink and, faintly, of sour milk, and light made patches of yellow on the scuffed wooden floors.

Simit droned through Languages, Structures, and Recitations. Jes glanced around the room at the small, age-graded groups. Except for the youngest, except for the two kasirene students who sat apart from the humans in the far end of the room, all the children could remember NewHome. What would they do if Jes told them Hetch's news? He imagined a shadow at the window, the Tri-Captain beckoning him out of the room and whispering, "I'm going to take NewHome. I need your help." Jes nodded and within seconds they were in the Tri-Captain's ship, rushing through Aerie grab into tau space, plunging from NewHome grab with zappers blazing into a confusion of black ships and invisible death rays.

"That's enough!" Simit shouted. "I've just about lost patience with you, Jes Kennerin. I expect to be listened to when I talk. March!"

The students tittered as Simit marched Jes to the hard-stool and left him there.

Simit had a long, red welt crossing his face diagonally, from forehead to nose to cheek and around the side of his neck into his hair. It had been given to him on NewHome. Jes watched the scar pucker and stretch as Simit talked. This time, his fantasy was far darker.

At lunch, Hart sat beside him under the schoolyard's kaedo and grabbed at his lunch.

"You eat your own," Jes said. "You always take half of mine and I never get enough."

"Come on, Jes, I'm hungry."

"Where's your lunch?"

"I forgot it." Hart looked at his brother innocently.

"You didn't. I saw you leaving with it this morning."

"I lost it. Come on, give me some. You've got too much, anyway. Laur always gives you more than me."

"Oh, all right. But don't eat all the cake this time, okay?"

Hart grabbed half his brother's cheese and stuffed it into his mouth, then took all of the cake and ran across the schoolyard.

"I'll get you for that!" Jes yelled, but his heart wasn't in it. Hart stuck out his tongue and went around the side of the schoolhouse. The two kassies squatted by the far gate, taking their lunches from their marsupial pouches. Jes could hear them talking to each other in kasiri. Jason had insisted that Aerie's native sentients be admitted to the school and treated like the human children, but Jes doubted whether the kassies liked this any more than did the Aerans. The older kassie stretched her first arms over her head and fiddled in her pouch with her second arms. Jes looked away and stood up. Simit had gone inside, and his two helpers stood in the building's shade, holding hands and oblivious to the children. Jes strolled to the edge of the yard and lounged against the fence, inspecting his boots. He glanced around again, then vaulted over the fence and ran into the bushes. No one cried out after him. Crazy old Gren appeared at his window, mouthed silent insults, and withdrew. He didn't leave his house, though, and after a moment Jes crossed the stream and made his way back to the Tor.

Laur was in the garden behind the house, pulling weeds from the ground with sharp movements of her hands and elbows. Meya played in the mud nearby, her chubby face streaked with dirt. Jes crept around the house until he heard voices coming from the study windows.

"...nothing else we can do," Mish said.

"I still don't like it," Jason muttered.

"That's too bad. It may not be much of a chance, but it's the only one we've got -- unless you've got some miracle up your sleeve."

"If I did, I'd have said so!" Jason yelled.

"Neither of you is rational," Hetch said with disgust. "Jase, Mish is right. We went over all of this last night. We don't have to do it again. I'll leave for NewHome and come back as soon as I have definite news -- a date, a time. You evacuate Haven, talk with the kasirene, prepare for some sort of guerrilla action here."

"I still think the Federation -- "

"Forget it, Jase. They're not going to get involved unless they have to."

"All right! So it's our only hope! I accept! But, damn it, Mish -- "

"No, Jason, I'm going with Hetch. I can't just sit here and wait.

Besides, you can handle the Aerans better than I can."

Jes caught his breath and stared at the blank wall of the house. The sunlight felt hot on his back.

"Mish," Hetch said.

"Don't you Mish me, Manny Hetch. I'm going. Why can't you both accept that?"

"Because if I have to die, I'd rather die beside you than alone," Jason said.

Jes made a face.

"I'm sorry," Mish said. "I'm going to get some stuff together. We should leave soon. You'll remember to take the caster with you, so you'll hear us when we're back?"

Jason didn't reply. Footsteps sounded, and Jes crept into the bushes.

He crouched there for a moment, touching his flute, then ran down the hill to the pad. Hetch had, as usual, left the shuttle unlocked. Jes swung himself up through the hatchway and glanced around the corridor. He went to the cargo hold and hid in a nest of webbing. It was cold and smelled of metal and oil.

He pulled a web around him, then froze as he heard Captain Hetch and his mother enter the ship. They didn't come into the hold. Within moments the shuttle's engines kicked to life, and their pounding moved in counterpoint to the pounding of his own heart.

There were no ports or screens in the hold, of course, but Jes knew what the 'Folly' looked like. She'd be a Class 5b/14 merchant ship, shaped like a layer cake. Her top layer housed bridge, crew quarters, passenger quarters, galley, and all the human places on a ship. Her bottom layer would be engine room, reactors, and, spaced evenly around the bottom of the layer, the huge thrusters which propelled her through space. It didn't matter that her broadest surface faced forward; she never entered an atmosphere where resistance would be any problem. On short hops, like the four-lightyear jump between Aerie and NewHome, 'Folly' would be accelerating almost constantly, and the acceleration pull would serve as a pseudo-gravity.

The Tri-Captain's main ship never entered an atmosphere, either, Jes remembered, but the illustrations showed the 'Tiger' as sleek, pointed, finned, and shiny -- a far more exciting shape than 'Folly''s flatness.

The shuttle docked with the 'Folly' amid a clanging of metal on metal and a shriek of hinges. Jes remained very still as Mish and the captain climbed out of the hatch. He could hear voices in the bay, Hetch giving orders, others responding, his mother explaining something in a firm, even tone. The voices moved away, and after listening to the silence for a while, Jes undid his webbing and ventured into the corridor. The hatch was still open; beyond it he could see the dim reaches of the bay, and the shapes of the other shuttles lined one after another in the darkness. The pressure in his ears shifted, an almost subliminal hum ran through the hold, and 'Folly' slid out of orbit toward the grab. Excited, Jes peered around until he found the corridor and ran toward it, his shoes in his hands.

The corridor was empty and bright, punctuated by closed doors down its length. Jes could not tell what direction he faced. The pressure shifted again, and the 'Folly' veered. He lost his balance and fell hard against the corridor's curved wall.

"Holy light!" A thin, fair spacer stuck his head out of a door and saw Jes. "What the hell -- "The spacer grabbed Jes and hauled him into the room.

"You dumb brat, don't you know we're about to -- "

The room seemed to shrink, expand, turn inside out, flutter, and before Jes could cry out it stabilized again.

" -- go through grab? Who the hell are you? Bakar, what's this?"

"My name is Jes Kennerin," Jes said. "My mother and I are going to spy on NewHome."

The one named Bakar rose and glared at Jes. "Wait'll Hetch hears about this," he said. "Come on, snuff. March."

"Where?" Jes demanded.

"Bridge first. Maybe the brig after. Stowaways aren't welcome."

"The bridge?" Jes repeated. "Okay, let's go."

Bakar grimaced, wrapped a large, scarred hand around Jes' smaller one, and dragged him out of the room and up the corridor.

One bulkhead in the bridge was covered with clocks, handed and digital, one-, two-, and three-dimensioned, lit and dark, large and small. Jes slumped lower in his seat and stared at them while Mish and Hetch argued over his head.

"Damn it, Manny, I'm not a mind-reader. I didn't know he had stowed away."

"I can't run this ship with a kid aboard. I didn't want to go to NewHome to begin with; it's dangerous. Bad enough that you're aboard, but a kid -- "

"Will you pay atten -- "

"Comes from letting them run wild. Why in hell don't you keep a watch on -- "

"Shut up," Bakar said. "Not going to change things by yelling. Kid's aboard. Now what?"

Jes risked a glance at the adults. Mish stood with her arms folded, back to Hetch, while the short, rotund captain glared at his first mate.

"You, Bakar." Hetch's face turned purple. "I've about had it with you."

Bakar gestured. "You want me to flip around?"

"No," Mish said. She turned back to Hetch and put her hand on the stargrid. Darkness and pricks of light outlined her fingers. "We haven't got time. If we go back to Aerie now, we might as well not leave again."

Hetch glanced at the chronometers, then raised his hands, palms up.

"All right, the kid stays."

Jes cheered and bounded from his chair. Bakar swiped at him and knocked him back down.

"The brig, Captain?"

"It's an idea." Hetch tugged at his beard and looked at Jes. "It would keep him out of the way."

"Oh, come on," Jes protested. "Mish, you tell him not to lock me up."

"It's his ship." Mish rapped her fingers against the stargrid. "I have no say in the matter."

"How am I going to help save Aerie if you keep me locked up?"

His mother and the captain looked startled. Under their prodding, Jes explained how he had overheard their discussions.

"Stowaway, and a spy, too. I 'should' put you in the brig, but I haven't got the crew to watch you." Behind Hetch, the screens showed the dizzying lights of tau space. They gleamed, reflected off the captain's bald head. Hetch smiled and looked at Bakar.

"You watch him," Hetch said.

"I'm mate, not a nursemaid." Bakar sounded alarmed.

"Too bad. Next time watch your mouth around me. Make sure he doesn't break anything or get hurt."

"Give him to Tham. Or Merkit."

"Merkit's pulled engine room. Go on, get him out of here."

Glowering, Bakar grabbed Jes' arm and dragged him from the bridge. Jes looked down the smooth, curved corridor, twisting his head to look at the passing doors.

"How long are we in tau? How fast are we going? Are they going to shoot at us? Will you teach me how to fly the ship? Why did you -- "

"Shut up," Bakar said. He pushed Jes through a door and entered after him. The spacer who had first spotted Jes looked up from a mess of wires and black panels. He grinned at Bakar.

"Hello, nanny," he said. Bakar swung at him and he ducked. "Hetch left the coms on."

Bakar said something under his breath and pushed Jes into a seat.

"Stay put." He went into an adjoining room.

"Are you Merkit?" Jes said to the spacer.

"Me? Hell, no, I'm not that ugly. I'm Tham Hecate." Tham stuck out his hand, and Jes shook it.

"Are you a mate, too?"

"Nope. I'm your all-around spacejock. Anything needs doing, I'm it.

Hump it, fix it, run it, find it, make it -- that's me."

Bakar came in with two strips of brown stuff and a tube. He thrust a strip and the tube at Jes.

"Eat."

Jes looked at the tube and strip. "I'm not hungry."

"Will be. Don't eat now, won't until next watch. Ship, not a suckin'

restaurant."

Jes put the strip to his mouth and licked. It was tough and bland.

"Go on. Eat it."

Bakar chomped down his strip and went into the next room. Jes leaned toward Tham.

"Is he always this mean?" Jes whispered.

Tham laughed. "Bakar's the meanest bastard in West Wing."

Bakar came in again. "You're the stupidest. Come on, snuff."