I was about to say that we had brought only one, and had slept for most of the voyage under sailcloth and our clothing, but Seawrack explained that we had bought blankets in Wichote and rose to get him one. I suggested that he might want some sailcloth as well, in case of rain.

"All right." For a second or two he fingered his reclaimed hunting knife. "We could trade for some furs with people around here, if you've got anything to trade."

I nodded and said that I should have thought of that when we put in at Wichote.

"They'd skin you there."

(My irony had been wasted.) "Only out here and farther west you can get good furs cheap because they don't want to have to load them in their boats and take them down the river to sell."

He accepted the blanket that would be his from that moment forward. "After we bring back Silk I'm going to build a real big boat and just go back and forth trading. I'll buy slug guns and stuff like that back home and sell them for furs all up and down the river, and then go back for more."

It recalled what the traveler had said, and I asked him whether he had been farther west than we were now.

"Oh, sure. I've been to Pajarocu. I hung around there about a week waiting for you, then I started back down looking for you."

Seawrack said admiringly, "You're very brave to travel alone here in that little boat."

"Thanks." He smiled, and for a moment I actually liked him. "See, a little boat like mine is what you need out here, so you can get way over to one side and paddle. My father's probably hanging on to this big one 'cause we're going to have to have it to bring Silk back to New Viron in. We'll have to have something that can make it across. That's right, isn't it, Father?"

Back to Seawrack before I had a chance to reply. "This one will do it. It'll be fast, too, when we're going back down, bringing Silk back. We'll need it because the lander's coming right straight back to Pajarocu, when it comes back." He waited for one of us to challenge him.

"You bet it is. They're not going to let a thing like that get away from them. Would you? There's quite a few towns over on the other side that've got landers that work. That's what I heard. Only they won't let anybody but their own people get anywhere around them. Just try it and you'll get shot. Some won't even own up that they've got them."

I cleared my throat. "I've been thinking. I want to propose a plan to both of you."

Sinew held up his knife, inspecting its blade by the last light of the day that was now past. "You nicked the edge," he said, and inspected the place with a thumbnail.

"I know. I've been cutting wood with it. I had to." I expected him to enlarge upon his complaint; but he did not.

Seawrack had been studying his face. "You don't look very much like your father."

"Everybody says I do."

She shook her head, and he smiled.

I asked them, "May I tell you what I propose? The plan I mentioned?"

"Sure." Sinew sheathed his knife.

"As you said, we'll need this boat when the lander returns. As you also said, it's not well suited to river travel. Seawrack and I have seen that for ourselves. So has Krait."

I waited for his agreement, and got it.

"Seawrack and I haven't talked very much about the hazards involved in flying back to the Whorl Whorl on a lander jury-rigged by somebody in Pajarocu. Neither did you and I before I left, and I don't like to talk about it even now. I don't enjoy sounding as if I were boasting about the dangers I'll face. I don't even like to think about them, and I'd gladly make them less-if I could." on a lander jury-rigged by somebody in Pajarocu. Neither did you and I before I left, and I don't like to talk about it even now. I don't enjoy sounding as if I were boasting about the dangers I'll face. I don't even like to think about them, and I'd gladly make them less-if I could."

"It looks pretty good, that lander," Sinew assured me. "I've seen it."

I nodded. "I'm very glad to hear that. But before I continue, I ought to ask you something. What happened to our old boat, the one you set out in?"

He shrugged. "I traded it for the one I've got now and some other stuff."

"May I ask what the other stuff was?"

"It doesn't matter. It's gone now."

"What was it?"

"I said it doesn't matter!"

"He's hungry," Seawrack interposed. "Would you like a piece of smoked meat, Sinew?"

"Sure. Thanks."

This time I waited until he was chewing it. "I have to go on that lander. I promised I would, and I intend to. Krait wants to go, too. He's told me why, and he has an excellent reason; but he made me promise not to reveal it. Neither of you have any reason at all."

They objected, but I silenced them. "As I said, it will be very dangerous. It's quite possible that the lander will explode, or catch fire, or crash when it tries to take off. Even if it flies away safely and crosses the abyss between the whorls, landing in the Whorl is liable to be very difficult. Krait's been concerned about you, Seawrack. I doubt that he's told you, but he has been."

She shook her head.

"He'd been assuming that you'd come with us if there was a place for you on it. He mentioned it to me not long ago, and I said just what I'm saying now, that it's too dangerous to subject you to. I told him that I intended to leave you in Pajarocu until I came back."

Seawrack shook her head again, this time violently, and Sinew said, "Me, too? I won't."

"Krait had objections as well. He pointed out that she would be an attractive young woman alone and friendless in a strange town. I had to admit that he was right." I rilled my lungs with air, conscious of what failure to persuade them now would mean.

"So here's the new plan I would like to propose. When Krait returns in the morning, we'll go back to Wichote. We'll be sailing with the current then, and it shouldn't take more than two or three days."

Sinew's nod was guarded.

"When we get there, Krait and I will trade for another little boat like the one you have. He and I will take those two boats to Pajarocu. You and Seawrack will wait for us in Wichote, on this one."

"No." Seawrack sounded as firm as I was ever to hear her, and that was very firm indeed.

"You won't be alone there, either of you. Furthermore, you'll have this boat to live on, together. And if I'm not back within a month or so..." I shrugged.

In so low a tone that I scarcely heard him, Sinew said, "I knew you didn't want me as soon as I saw you. Only I didn't think you'd give her up to get rid of me."

"I'm not trying to get rid of you. Can't you get it through your head that I may never come back? That I may die? I'd like to arrange things so that neither of you dies with me." It was so dark by that time that it was difficult for me to see their faces; I looked from one to the other, hoping for support.

Seawrack said, "Sinew's been to Pajarocu. He can take us to it."

Sinew nodded.

I said, "If you found it, so can Krait and I."

There was a long silence after that. Sinew took advantage of it to get himself another strip of smoked meat, and I am going to take advantage of it now to get a little sleep before Jahlee and Evensong come.

Heavy rain from midnight on, which gave us good cover. I did not go out or even get up this morning, although my wound seems better-breakfast in bed from a tray, and so forth. Hari Mau talked with me as I lay in bed, stamping up and down the room and more than ready to fall upon the Hannese that very moment. He had ridden half the morning with a rain-soaked, bloodstained bandage where his white headcloth ought to be, and is planning a major attack as soon as the rainy season ends. Our enemies are weaker than they look, he says, and I pray to the Outsider and any other god who may read this that he is correct. He swears diat if I could talk with his new prisoners I would agree.

He has gone now, and I have gotten up to write this in my nightclothes, more than half ashamed.

We could have built a fire in the box or lit the lantern that night on the sloop, but we did not. The darkness and the overpowering presences of the forest and the swiftly sinister river created an atmosphere that I cannot possibly convey with ink on paper. The people of Shadelow believe that each of their rivers has a minor god of its own who lives in and under it and governs it, a god whose essence it is. Also that the forests hold minor gods and goddesses as numerous as their animals, gods and goddesses for the most part malign and unappeasable. When Seawrack spoke to Sinew and me that night in the dark, it almost seemed to me that we had one with us on the sloop. What it must have seemed to Sinew, who did not know her as I did, is far beyond my ability to express.

"You said it was good that I can't drown," she began. "Do you remember that?"

I did.

"I said I wished I could." There was an odd, rough sound, loud in the silence; after a moment I realized that she was scratching Babbie's ears. "You thought it was foolish of me, wanting to drown. But I don't want to drown. I've seen a lot more drowned people than you have, probably. I've seen what die sea does to them, and watched Mother eat them, and eaten them myself."

For the space of a score of breaths no voices were heard but die wind's and the river's.

"What I'd like is to be able to, because you can. You think I can wait for you in that town where the river comes to the sea. Do you think Babbie will wait, too? Do you think he can live in the forest until you come back, and then come back to you?"

"No, I don't," I said, "although Babbie has surprised me before."

"You don't think he's a real person. To you he's just like Krait, and Krait's not a real person either."

I tried to say that I did not think Babbie a person at all, that Babbie was not a human being like Krait and the three of us. I cannot be certain now precisely how I may have put it, although I am quite sure I put it badly. Whatever lies I may have told, and however I phrased diem, I made Seawrack angry.

"That's not what I said! That's not what I said at all! You're twisting all the words around. You do it once or twice every day, and I'd do anything, if only I could make you stop it."

"I apologize," I told her. "I didn't intend to. If that isn't what you meant, what did you mean?"

Sinew began, "Did she really-?"

She cut him off. "What I'm trying to say is, there are two people on this boat you don't think are people at all, Babbie and Krait. You don't think they are, but you're wrong. You're wrong about both of them."

Sinew muttered, "He doesn't think I'm anybody either."

"Yes, he does!" In the chill starlight, I could see her turn to face him. "You've got it exacdy backwards. No wonder you're his son."

While Sinew was wrestiing with that, she added, "It's the other part he doesn't like, the thingness. You try to be less of a person and more of a thing because you think that's what he wants, but it's really the other way." Her voice softened. "Horn?"

"Yes. What is it?"

"Tell me. Tell us both. What does it take to make a person for you?"

I shrugged, although she may not have seen it. "I'm not sure; maybe I've never thought enough about it. Maytera Marble is a person, even if she's a machine. An infant is a person, even if it can't talk."

I waited for Seawrack to reply, but she did not.

"A while ago you said that it was talking for you. The sea goddess spoke to you. So she was a person no matter how large she was or how she looked, and I have to agree. Then you said that Babbie is a person. But Babbie can't talk. I don't know what to tell you."

Sinew asked, "Babbie's the hus?"

"Yes. Mucor gave him to me. I don't believe you've ever seen Mucor, but you must have heard your mother and me mention her many times."

"She could just sort of be there. Look out of mirrors and things."

"That's correct."

Seawrack said, "She sounds like me. Is she very much like me, Horn?"

"No."

Sinew asked, "Can she do that stuff?"

I was not quite certain that he was addressing me, but I said, "Do you mean Seawrack? I'm no expert on what Seawrack can do. If she says she can, she can."

"I can't," Seawrack told me, "but Mucor reminds me of me, just the same."

"In one way, I agree. Both of you have been very good friends to me."

Again almost whispering, Sinew said, "I've been hearing about Mucor ever since I was a sprat, only I thought she was just a story. You know? Way out here, she's real. When I was in town," (he meant New Viron) "somebody said you'd been to see the witch. That was her, wasn't it? You went to see her like you'd go to see Tamarind."

"Yes."

"Babbie can talk," Seawrack insisted. "He talks to me and to you all the time, it's just that you hardly ever pay attention."

Babbie stood and shook himself, then lay down again with his broad, bristle-covered back against my legs and his head in my lap. I said, "Can you really speak, Babbie?" and felt his head move in reply.

"You think Krait is a-a monster, like an inhumi. I don't like him either, he's not nice, but he's a person."

Sinew asked her, "Is Krait the boy that looks like me?"

"Yes, our son."

I should have made some attempt to straighten that out, but I did not. The hisses and whisperings of water and wind closed around us once more while I sat silent and tense, waiting for Sinew to fly into one of his rages. The back of my neck prickled, and the left side of my face cringed under the regard of his unseen eyes.

"Father?"

"Yes. What is it?"

"About Mucor. Is she listening to us now?"

"I have no way of knowing. I suppose it's possible, but I doubt it."

"In your book-"

Confident that he had never read it, I remained silent; and eventually he began to explain what we had been talking about to Seawrack. "In the book, every so often Patera Silk would wonder if Mucor was around, so he'd call her. He'd say her name, and if she was there she'd answer some way. Ask him to do it now."

I was stroking Babbie's head; Seawrack's hand found mine there, and its lightest touch thrilled me. "Will you Horn? Do you want to?"

"No," I said. "If Sinew wants Mucor called, let him call for her himself."

Sinew was silent.