Antares went below and found a couple of cushions, and they sat together with their backs to the hatch, facing the water. The chill and the physical discomfort were pushed out of his mind by a sudden spangle of color--sunset over the sea, orange and crimson peeking through the clouds, then a flash of green before it all faded to twilight. Overhead, a handful of stars were already p.r.i.c.king the sky. Bandicut felt his heart race at the sight of stars, and he wondered where in that sky his sun was, the sun of Earth.

Antares' hand touched his. Her lips were parted in a querying smile.

nenever you re ready," he murmured.280 * *

Antares opened the collar of her suit to expose the two stones glimmering white and deep ruby in her throat. "Bring our stones together? Is that what we do?"

He nodded and raised his hands, and she took them in hers and held them close to her throat. It was awkward, and they shifted around a little, trying to get comfortable. Finally he rested the edges of his hands on her shoulders, and she gently pulled his wrists close to her throat.

He could feel the stones beginning to join already, the aura of her personality welling up to brush against his--and in the back of his mind, but not too far back, the quarx watching the contact with extreme interest. And then the world seemed to recede around them, and he was aware of a current flowing from his stones to hers and back again, and her thoughts stretching out to meet his John Bandicut, human of Earth and Triton...

Antares...

Yes. Autumn Aurora (Red Sun) Alexandrovens, Thespi third-female...

This is not alien to you, this...joining. Is it like what you do on Thespi Prime?

Like, but dferent. There we joined with emotions only. But you and I... we can share thoughts and memories...

And even as she spoke in the silence of the stones, he began to feel her thoughts and memories lapping against his.., and he knew she was already learning from his memories ... of life on Triton and on Earth, of Julie, of his companion-for-life, the quarx...

And in turn he felt the memories of Thespi Prime opening to him. Thespi Prime. A place of very great beauty, a harsh beauty. A place of mountains and rugged forests in the region where she lived; and a harsh people in certain ways, a people of difficult and perilous customs. The images came quickly: her training as a third-female, a station in which she was skilled, joining others together in empathic contact. But it was a life ill-suited to her, a life of confines and restrictions, and tempered desires. He felt in a dizzying rush her time of succ.u.mbing to forbidden love, under laws in which she stood responsible but her lover did not; and he felt how close she had come to leaving that world through the gateway of death, imposed by the law. But then the stones came into her life--he could not quite glimpse how it happened, a vision of a beam of*

THE INFINITE SEA * 281.

light flashing into her prison cell, glittering and swirling, dizzying her.., and transporting her from this world to another.., through transitional s.p.a.ces, along a churning light directed by unseen hands.

And if she didn't understand it, either, she came in time to know that she had pa.s.sed through a different kind of gateway, the star-spanner to Shipworld.

It was like a walk through a garden of images, this sharing; more open, more inclusive and intimate than the sharing with Ik had been. And it was not just Antares and John; he felt the quarx joining, as well--and caught glimpses of Charlie's previous lives that Bandicut had never seen before, worlds and peoples lost now in deep time...

And all the while, the stones hummed like living things, absorbing and exchanging knowledge and language, and he was dizzily aware that they would never now go back to the isolation that had divided them before. He knew now, they all knew.., all three of them, so much more...

The night sky was full of stars over their heads as the joining slipped away. The first sound Bandicut heard was the lapping of water against the Neri habitat. The second sound was Antares' indrawn breath, and quiet sigh. She still held his wrists to her throat. "You, John Bandicut," she whispered, "are a very interesting.., man."

Her eyes gleamed in the dark like starlight on gold.

He half-smiled. And since his hands were practically cradling her head anyway, he gently slipped his fingers into her hair and cradled her face in his hands, and he liked the feel of that, and sensed that she did, too. After a moment, he leaned forward and kissed her on the forehead. She sighed again, and he felt her curiosity and liking, and a certain puzzlement about what he was doing, and a certain unusual lack of... caution.

Very gently, he raised her chin, and brushed her lips with his, and held the kiss for a moment. He felt a shiver, a thrill; and also uncertainty, a reflex to shake the touch away because it was an alien touch. "Mm?" he murmured, thinking, why do I feel that way? And then he realized that it was not his feeling, it was hers. But her eyes caught and held his as he gazed into her face, and her hands pressed his against her cheeks.

And then he felt a shadow appear, slipping between them, an old barrier of caution and fear. Thespi third-females do not do this,282 * .

he thought. Especially they do not do this with aliens, non-Thespi.

Or perhaps it was not so much the alienness of him as simply the doing.., of something forbidden.

"John Bandicut," she whispered fiercely, "I am pleased to know you, my friend." And with those words, she brought his hands away from her face, and held them clasped in hers, and then released them. And the moment was over.

He sighed softly, trying to hide his jangled emotions, and the straining physical arousal in his groin, and the unreasoning desire to bury himself in her hair, in her body...

"/I am confused.

It is powerful, so powerful . . . "/ "John Bandicut, I feel it, it is a fine feeling, do not try to hide it.

I cannot--" uuhhhl"--I must--but--" And hissing softly, Antares stopped trying to find words to explain, and finally touched his ',.

hands again and lowered her gaze.

He swallowed and murmured, "It's okay, yes. It's all right." And even though it wasn't exactly all right, he wanted it to be so, he wanted to feel those feelings, and he wanted this moment, which had not quite fully materialized, to last forever.

They slept below, all three in the one main living compartment, Antares and Bandicut lying close but not quite touching. Bandicut was aware of S'Cali getting up and moving quietly about several times during the night. Apparently he felt too uneasy to sleep, or felt he needed to keep checking on things, perhaps to make sure no landers were about. Some time past the middle of the night--realnight, not the perpetual gloom of the deep--Bandicut awoke, aware of a pale light shining down through the ceiling of the habitat, through the surface of the water. He lay awhile, still half asleep, puz- zling over the light. When he realized what it was, his eyes popped wide open, and he slipped quietly from his blankets and crept up the ladder to stand on deck.

It was not just one moon, but two, silver-grey, over the sea. They were smaller than Earth's moon, but heartstoppingly beautiful, crown jewels in the night sky, the higher one about three-quarters full and the other a delicate crescent not far above the horizon. He stared at them, entranced, listening to the sea lapping at the habi- tat. A splash distracted him, then several more: fish jumping, sparkling like foil in the moonlight. He smiled, and gazed up at the*

THE INFINITE SEA * 283'.

stars salted across the sky. No patterns were recognizable to him, no hint of familiar constellations. Not that he had expected any. The great milky river of the galactic disk, edge-on, crossed the western part of the sky. It was impossible to be sure, but he thought it looked larger here than it had on Earth.

Was he closer to the galactic center? He didn't know, and it certainly made no practical difference; but the sight, charged by the reverberations of his joining with Antares, made him practically weep with homesickness. And at the same time, he felt a vast exhilaration in being here among the stars, first human to journey from the solar system, galactic wanderer, tossed on the tides of chaos and swept by the whim of forces he didn't know and couldn't understand.

Friend to wonderful aliens. He wasn't sure that he would give it up, even if he could. But a heartbeat later, his thoughts wandered to Julie Stone, and he began to feel a very different kind of ache...

Julie, Julie . . .

His vision blurred, and his thoughts turned into a hopeless jum-ble-and when Antares appeared at his side, he nearly jumped. He felt her instant concern: "John Bandicut, are you all right?" She crouched close and he murmured back, "Yes yes, fine," and gestured an invitation to sit.

She joined him, looking at the moon and the stars, and he began to feel better. She turned a little away from him, but leaned against his shoulder in a comradely fashion. They were mostly silent. He found himself aware of what she was feeling--warmth and loneliness and uncertainty--even while caught up in his own feelings. Eventually Antares went below again, touching his hand in farewell, and he remained a little longer, shivering in the sea air but reluctant to give up his first night under the stars since their arrival on this world.

When he went below again and shivered into his blanket, both Antares and S'Cali were sound asleep.

The morning dawned grey and chilly. He could sense it even below the surface. When he went topside, he found Antares scanning the sky and the sea, which had considerably more chop to it than last night. She greeted him soberly. "S'Cali got a message that there may be an Astari ship headed this direction, so we need to keep a sharp watch. He wants to take us down soon."284 * .

Bandicut nodded glumly. He gazed at the fast-moving, low stratus clouds that were turning the world grey, and thought, Please, just one more good look at the sun before we go back under.

S'Cali called from the hatch, "We must depart. L'Kell's sub is almost to the salvage area. They were able to decompress more quickly than they expected. They want us to meet them."

Bandicut turned for one last look. He was rewarded by the sight of the clouds streaming apart and breaking momentarily to reveal one small section of sunlit sky, with a broad sunbeam slanting down over the ocean. He murmured a silent thanks, and followed Antares down the ladder.

S'Cali was busy disconnecting the power lines to the sub and straightening up the habitat. They gave him a hand, and watched as he worked the habitat controls. A sheet of fine bubbles billowed away from the sides of the habitat, and after a minute they began to sink. Looking up, they could see the surface slowly receding, until the overhead hatch was perhaps twenty meters below the surface.

Then they boarded the sub.

As they fell away into the depths, the solar arrays seemed to drift upward like a vast, unfurled parachute floating on the wind. Soon they were moving at a steady cruise, with neither bottom nor surface in sight, just continuous blue water. S'Cali steered by some combination of instinct and Neri instrumentation. Bandicut thought of the potential confrontation that awaited, and took comfort in Antares' presence, though not without a tingle of wistfulness.

"/You will, in time, explain these con fused feelings to me, won 'I you? "/ The quarx spoke with an earnestness that surprised him. Without saying anything more in words, she showed him her own confusion at the intensity of the emotions that she had shared with him, not just as an observer but as one who had personally touched Antares. She too felt a deepening bond with the Thespi woman, but was bewildered, caught up in Bandicut's feelings of s.e.xual attraction.

And in truth, it was not just the attraction to Antares that had stirred Char's emotions, but the reminder of her aloneness in the universe. All of them here were cut off from their own worlds, probably forever, but Char alone believed that her people were proba-*

THE INFINITE SEA * 285.

bly extinct but for her. Even Ik, rescued from his homeworld's destruction, had reason to think that some of his fellow Hraachee'ans had also been transported--somewhere, somehow--to Shipworld.

But the quarx, or at least her predecessors, had been quite convinced of her/his/its existential aloneness. It had been a part of her life for millions of years now. And this new closeness with Bandi-cut and Antares had put it into bold relief.

/Yah,/Bandicut said silently. /Look, as far as my own feelings are concerned, I don't know if I can explain. I'm not sure/understand it. But you have my permission to poke around the subconscious and see what you find./ "/But...

you want her. Physically.

Don't you?"/ /Well, I--/ "/Your nerve endings were positively aflame.

Especially down in your--"/ /Yes, okay, I wanted her. At that moment, for sure. Right now, I--it's more confused./ "/You're not sure?"/ /Well, I do and I don't./ "/???"/.

He sighed. /Look, guys aren't so great at getting all introspective about this stuff./ "/That sounds like an excuse, if you don't mind my saying so."/ /Huh?/His face stung./As a matter of fact, I do mind. Look, people don't like being rejected, okay?/ "/But she didn 'I reject you/ She just... . she said those feelings were good.

But it wash 'I the gbt-- "/ /Yeah, sure. That's one way of looking at it, and it's very rational and so on. But I'm just telling you what I maybe fee/, which is different from logic./ "/You're mad.

You're mad at her, aren't you?"/ Bandicut felt a flush in his face. His eyes were closed./I'm not mad. I'm iust--/He couldn't believe this--couldn't believe what he was feeling. Was the quarx tapping into all of his repressed286 * *

emotions? /Look, I'm not sure this is such a good line of ques- tioning./ "/I'm sorry.

You said it was okay to poke around.

I guess I shouldn't--"/ /No, it's okay. It is. But--well, there are some things that most guys would just as soon leave under wraps./ "/That's really weird.

But if it's a... guy thing... ?"/ /Yeah. Don't worry about it. I mean, it's all right for you to look, and ask./ ,.

"/Okay."/ ,3.

/Okay./Bandicut drew a deep breath and slowly let it out. He opened his eyes and stared at the blue haze flying toward them as ,,.

they sped through the water. Gradually, he shifted his gaze over to ,,"'.

steal a glance at Antares. She was peering off to the side, scanning .i1 the view. She seemed unaware of his inner discussion. Her hair was ',}.

loose and somewhat tangled over her shoulders. She smelled pine- like, with a hint of musk, which he guessed was what Thespi women smelled like when they hadn't had a fresh morning shower in a while. He didn't want to think what aromas he might be giv- ing off.

Right now, he thought, he didn't honestly want that kind ofcontact with her, anyway. Make love with an alien? She was at- tractive, yes, but only in certain ways of looking at her. It wasn't as if...

Like h.e.l.l. He wanted her, all right.

"/Well, I should think so.

You've got an erection again."/ /Mokin' fokin' .../ He shifted position, and quit looking at Antares, his rush of desire dispersed like a cloud of smoke./Char, that sort of thing just happens sometimes. You can't--I mean, it's not as if---/ "/Yeah, mokin' A right."/ /Oh, shut up, will you?/he said, this time with feeling.

Startled, Char answered, "/I'm sorry. Really.

I really hope it happensforyou, someday."/ And then she did shut up. And Bandicut rode in silence, won-THE INFINITE SEA * 287 dering if he was just imagining the soft empathic Thespi voice acknowledging his jangled feelings, and soothing him, saying it was okay ... and he focused every fiber of his conscious will on listening to the drone of the sub through the water.LI-JARED, CROUCHED beside Harding at the small side view- }.

port, felt a rush of excitement as he watched the other Neri sub materialize out of the misty distance. It had been a torment, being cooped up in the submarine, feeling cut 1'.

off from the rest of the world. But the growing natural light outside the sub had helped to soothe his nerves, and now seeing the ves- sel carrying his friends was enough to make him rejoice.

He'd been thinking about his long talks with Harding during the trip, hearing about the Astari people, how they had carved an ex- istence from the coast of an alien sea, and spread inland but always with a need to remain close to the sea that had claimed their star- ship. Something in the Astari people had always wanted one day to find a way to return to that starship, to reclaim something of what was theirs. Not so much their equipment, Harding thought, as their sense of heritage. Many of the Astari still felt themselves to be ex- iles on this planet, stranded by a queer twist of destiny. They be- lieved they would return one day to the stars--either as a people, or individually, in death. It was not too different from the way many Karellians viewed life: as a great endless cycle tied invisibly to the great coils of energy that surrounded and entwined their world.

Li-Jared had a lot in common with this being, besides their stones. He wished they could have spent more time talking. But Harding still tired easily, and had to share his time talking in the c.o.c.kpit with L'Kell, who was at least as full of questions as Li-Jared.

One thing that was clear, though, was that the Astari were no sim- pler or more predictable a people than any others Li-Jared had known. Harding guessed that some might welcome his efforts at*

THE INFINITE SEA * 289.

diplomacy, while others would oppose it. And Harding couldn't even be sure at what level decisions would be made about their proposals; they might be made by the expedition commander, or by the ruling committees ash.o.r.e.

Harding stirred, rubbing his houndlike nose as he crouched behind L'Kell and his copilot Jontil, and watched the sub carrying Bandicut and Antares come alongside. "One step closer," he hissed, pleased. He had been wheezing some for the last hour or so--and for that matter, so had Li-Jared--but they both generally seemed to have weathered the ascent in good health. The Neri had done their best to provide smooth decompression, but with the constant change in pressure, humidity, and gas mixture, it was not surprising that they felt a little shaky.

L'Kell called back, "We'll be in sight of the salvage site soon.

Have you decided how you want to make your approach?"

"I think," said Harding, "that we should just broadcast my voice, and then see what happens. They might not recognize my voice through the water, but surely we'll get their attention."

"Getting their attention," L'Kell said wryly, "was not what I was worried about."

"Then I guess we'll have to trust that they won't want to risk killing me, and will hold off with the heavy bursters." He paused, and in the silence, it seemed to Li-Jared that L'Kell was trying to decide just how serious the lander was being. Finally Harding continued, "They wouldn't expect you to go right up and say h.e.l.lo. If we actually do that, I think they'll take notice--and will want to see what you intend. And then perhaps.., well, we'll see."

Li-Jared remained silent, though the whole business worried him. This was their show; he was only here to help, if he could, through the affinity of his stones with Harding's. At the moment, that seemed a very tenuous role.

It was not long before they came within sight of the sunken starship.

Li-Jared and Harding peered out the left porthole, angling to try to get a good look at the wreck. As the sub swung into a right turn, Li-Jared caught his first clear view. The wrecked vessel was huge and ungainly, and yet at the same time he could see much of its original smooth lines, now broken in places by the crash. Here, in the fog of the undersea world, the starship looked as though it would be perfectly at home in the far vaster sea of s.p.a.ce, probing star streams and nebulas.290 * *

"Astari in sight," L'Kell said. "Harding, can you come forward?"

As Jontil and Harding exchanged places in the c.o.c.kpit, L'Kell al- tered course again, cutting off most of Li-Jared's view of the ship-- but not before he glimpsed a group of tiny, dark figures floating above the wreck. His two hearts stuttered and momentarily went out of synch. "Say the right words," he whispered softly, speaking to Harding, to himself, to the stones.

"Outside speakers are on," said L'Kell. "Speak into the comm, whenever you're ready."

For a moment, Harding merely c.o.c.ked his head to peer out the viewport at the shipwreck and his fellows. The sub's headlights were ,.

on, announcing their approach. Finally Harding spoke. 'ttention/ ,.