 
The Empire

By

Anne Spackman

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2014 by Anne Spackman

All Rights Reserved.

Cover art by Boris Rasin

Chapter One

Nerena Zadúmchov entered the world boldly—so said her father, the Grand Marshall Zadúmchov, interpreting the hearty cries of his newborn daughter. He was pleased when she was born, and she soon became the apple of his eye.

The world Nerena had been born into, namely the planet Seynorynael, was the center of the Federation of Planets, ruled by the Seynorynaelian Council of Elders.

Nerena was a stubborn, independent girl who was born into a society that was rigid and technologically advanced enough to grow almost all children ectogenetically—only the elite, of which Nerena's family belonged, still had to right to have natural children not grown in an ectogenesis womb. Nerena was a natural birth.

If only Nerena had understood the manner in which she had entered the world, the baby Nerena would have known that her voice would never reach beyond the narrow walls of the lush and beautiful family estate. She would have known that the world turned a deaf ear to the powerless. For as rich and powerful as her father was, Nerena herself was powerless. And her fate had already been decided—mostly by her own father. Nerena would be her father's pawn, wed to another wealthy and powerful family's son. The Grand Marshall had plans for his daughter to be his political tool, perhaps used to placate some political rival by a promise of being connected to the renowned and powerful Zadúmchov family.

Yet who was this General Zadúmchov, the Grand Marshall?

General Zadúmchov was indeed powerful. He held two titles, in addition to his rank of General in the Martial Scientific Force, that of the Grand Marshall also the title of "the Coordinator of the Expansion". This meant he had orchestrated the incorporation of several Federation planets and continued to manage the expansion of Seynorynael's Federation being, as it were, the Seynorynaelian Council's chief right arm in the Martial Scientific Force. Zadúmchov was a renowned political and wartime leader for the Federation of Planets. Zadúmchov reported only to the Federation Council, which was mostly guided by the Seynorynaelian Council, and to Elder Markankeil, head of the Federation Council and de-facto ruler of the planet Seynorynael and its Federation.

Elder Marankeil was a man of great mystery, who was much revered, yet also feared. Though, in actuality, he was no longer a living man.

Elder Marankeil had become a mechanized creature called a mechanized unit, which was an immortal robot with the former memories of a living man programmed into its memory bank. Marankeil had, in many ways, taken over the government with his best friend, Ornenkai, who was also a mechanized being called a mechanized unit and on the Federation Council. Marankeil and Ornenkai were the two most prestigious and influential members of the Seynorynaelian Council, and the larger body of the Federation Council. They ruled the many worlds under their dominion, but were still only Elders in name.

In practice, they had the entire galaxy in their thrall.

One afternoon, while still a young girl, Nerena was walking along the beach in Firien City, and she pointing to the water's edge, for she had seen the grey and white kiri birds eating scraps. Nerena cried,

"Look, mother!" Accompanied by great shouts and much laughter, Nerena ran ahead to scare the small sea birds, who shrieked loudly and climbed swiftly into the air.

"Nerena, please, dear, try not to make a scene." Was all her mother Nalya Zadúmchov said before making a gesture to a servant robot to go and collect Nerena and bring the child under control once more.

Nalya Valeria Zadúmchov, Nerena's mother, had come from that kind of family that had been making society news before there was an expanded Federation, when there had been but the five-star ring of planets in the Seynorynaelian Federation of Planets. Nalya came from the Tyriessus family that had been a dynasty for more than three thousand years, that had once earned its prestige in service to the Marankeil family back in the first years of the mechanized Elder's restructuring of the government.

Nalya was beautiful, with a heart-shaped face that ended in a slightly pointed chin. Her manners were impeccable, and her demeanor was patrician, gentle, though she had a childish streak in her and could be petty.

Marankeil and his Elder Council had ruled the planet Seynorynael and its Federation now for thousands of years, and with their rise in power and prestige, certain families had also risen to prominence, including the Tyriessus family, of which Nalya had been a part.

"Ah, my sweet Dariel," Nalya had often proclaimed in happy tones, whenever news arrived that her eldest elder brother was coming to visit. "He was my mother's joy, you know. A kind and conscientious brother. I so love to see him." Nalya had just received word that her brother Dariel was going to visit again soon.

Nalya and her two elder brothers had been raised in the capital city of Ariyalsynai and in the family manor in foothills of the Kerrauchian mountains. Nalya had been trained in politics but was never expected to pursue a political career. At a tender age she had been brought to the city for a year of rigorous society training before her introduction to the elite; at her introductory ball she had first met the Grand Marshall, Zadúmchov. She could remember it well.

"My daughter, Grand Marshall Zadúmchov," Nolan Tyriessus had introduced Nalya to him. Nalya had been young and beautiful, refined, well-read, and well-mannered.

Zadúmchov was older than her, formerly married and a widower, with an elder son nearly grown and off in training somewhere in one of the city's rigorous and prestigious education centers.

"A vision," said Zadúmchov, looking long at Nalya and taking her hand. "Would you care to dance, my lovely one?"

"She would love to," Nolan had said, and he had moved smoothly aside in order for them to dance.

Nalya had taken the General's arm and had gone willingly, at first entranced by the power of Zadúmchov.

Zadúmchov was noble-looking in a manner reminiscent of cordan statues, with quick dark eyes and a rugged face, broad manly shoulders and hirsute, callused hands; he did not smile. And of course, everyone knew that the Grand Marshall bore the hereditary Zadúmchov title of "the Coordinator of the Expansion", an official duty bestowed upon the family for more than two thousand years by the mechanized Elder Marankeil.

"I have seen your manor house, once, when you were but a child," said Zadúmchov to Nalya as they danced.

This surprised her.

"Your father and I were acquaintances at school together."

"Ah," said Nalya, uncertain of what else to say to him.

Zadúmchov smiled at her, and she was won over, entirely, by his admiring glance and hard, shining eyes.

The Zadúmchov family was one of the oldest and most famous of Ariyalsynai, and only the most capable children of the line were chosen and trained for the position of the entire Federation's coordinator, that person who regulated the inclusion of new territories and petitions thereto from as far away as the nineteenth galaxy of the Great Cluster; the position necessitated significant relations with the council of mechanized Elders. Thus the Zadúmchovs bore the only acceptable working position in all of the Ariyalsynai elite that was neither entirely military or political. Incidentally, however, the Grand Marshall was also a general in the Martial Scientific Force.

"Your feet are feather light, young lady." Said the Grand Marshall. "Your father has had you taught well. I have known him a long time, but am glad to have now met you, young lady."

"It is my pleasure." Nalya had said, and had meant it at the time.

When she was younger, Nalya's heart had seemed involuntarily moved to admiration and adoration. And so she had really believed herself in love with the Grand Marshall when she became attached to him, which happened not long after Nalya's introductory ball.

However in time, as Nalya woke to the reality of her new life, long after the glamour of her passion for Zadúmchov had faded, she became like any woman disappointed in love.

Nalya soon came to understand that her husband didn't love her, that she was attached to a man who would never love her, or any woman, half so much as his work; and so her heart grew bitter and became empty. And she began to see her life as something that was meaningless, and that there was no hope or love left in her future. She had nothing to live for, except to live for its own sake.

"Darling." She had once called Zadúmchov. No longer.

Marshall Zadúmchov, an irascible man of keen judgment, had accepted his duty years before he ever knew what duty really entailed. He had been born the only child of the previous Great Coordinator, with several younger cousins waiting in the wings to assume his position if he could not pass muster in the eyes of the council of Elders as being worthy of the title. Zadúmchov had spent his life obeying orders under duress, attending the appropriate schools, fulfilling all that was expected of him, fulfilling his duty.

"I gave you a home, what more can you want or need?" he was fond of saying to Nalya whenever she made a sign that she was unhappy.

The greatest fortune of Zadúmchov's life was that he had actually been born with the desire to fulfill the role he had been born to play. He worked towards assuming the title from his father with a kind of ambition that kept anything from touching his senses that was not a part of his future responsibility. At the same time, Zadúmchov had been aware of his duty to produce scions to assume his place, and that ectogenesis was not a socially acceptable alternative for the most elite of the hierarchy. Thus he had chosen his first wife from a prestigious family who lived outside of Kilkor, thinking to bring her share of her family's land to his own family and to augment his own power and prestige.

Some time later Zadúmchov had learned that he had made a faux pas; first, he had been expected to marry from the political ring of Ariyalsynai. It also bothered him that his wife was not his equal in refinement or taste; she was his equal in land, title, and assets only. He attributed this lack of refinement to a want in training and her provincial upbringing and spent little time in her company.

His first wife had born him a son in the years that followed, a bright, fleet-footed boy that he fought hard to control. Some time later, his first wife had died of an incurable illness related to the premature radiation disease; Zadúmchov had determined after a while that he would become attached again, but this time he would find his wife from among the strongest political clans of the capital.

"She will be easy to govern," he had thought when he met Nalya. "And she is from the Tyressius family."

Zadúmchov found the young Nalya terribly naive; she was slim, docile, and extraordinarily beautiful, with a light, airy, cheerful disposition. He did not love her, though he admired her mental and physical qualities; he wanted to love her and felt a duty to try to make her feel some sense of happiness in order to keep the family morale high, but he couldn't seem to muster enough emotion to care for her. She was so little like him, with her mindless, cheerful moods and her odd, irrational habits.

By the time she knew she was pregnant, Nalya hadn't wanted the child, but she was afraid to seek the drug she needed to kill her unborn child, afraid that somehow someone would find out. She was not worried for Zadúmchov's feelings, but the reputation of her own family.

Nalya's small vein of pride was all that she possessed which still had value to her. She knew the child was a girl before it was born; she felt that Zadúmchov was certain to want a boy. She threw this at him later, hoping he would reject the child so that she would be free to love it.

He was extraordinarily pleased, not out of any parental love for it, but that at last he would have an heir for his title.

"I wish I could have gotten rid of it." Nalya had said in a small, hard voice when he told her how he felt about it. "I don't want this child. I shouldn't have let myself be dissuaded from destroying it by worrying about what society would think of me."

"Nonsense," her husband had returned, completely disregarding her words. "All women have a mothering instinct."

Nalya had laughed, a hollow laugh, a laugh that felt the absurdity of his comment; did he think she didn't know herself?

"You'd like to believe that," Nalya had told him. But, he had ignored her. "I should have destroyed this child. After all, your son left because he couldn't bear to have you as a father." She had said, fashioning her words to punish him, but then she realized they could do him no harm, because he did not respect her, because he didn't value what she said and never would.

"My son left because he is a fool." The Grand Marshall had replied, and said nothing else.

Nerena was born, and that was the end of the ongoing argument. After the birth of Nerena, Nalya and the Grand Marshall seldom ever exchanged a word.

For some reason, the Grand Marshall grew to love his daughter. At first merely his heir, later he came to treasure the child he felt had been wrongfully abandoned by its petulant, puerile young mother. Zadúmchov felt a strong protective bond for the infant Nerena, and his heart was inclined to cherish her as the one who would ensure the honor of his family name.

Nalya for her part wished her husband hadn't loved the child Nerena. In truth, she resented her daughter; she hated her daughter, because her daughter was a symbol that she was forever physically linked to this man who had become her husband; it was a horror to her to contemplate that a part of her had fused with the essence of this man, and that this fusion lived, breathed, and walked around in the form of their child. How could the child function, she wondered, being composed of such a polarity of two natures?

Of course, Nerena was ignorant to all of this. She was raised by a succession of tutors and nannies who professed to love her but departed with frightening regularity and were never heard from again; her father spent free afternoons instructing her, though he would not deign to childish nonsense and games.

"My clever girl." Zadúmchov would say to Nerena, for he valued Nerena's mind from the beginning, and he bolstered her courage. Later, he came to realize that she was in fact quick-minded with no small pleasure. From that moment on, Zadúmchov came to expect great things from his daughter one day; he loved her, chastised and scolded her, but rewarded her efforts enough to keep her motivation high, and in no short time, Nerena's existence revolved around pleasing her father.

Nerena wondered if her father knew how great it was, this power he wielded over her. Did her father know the kind of psychological power every father holds over his children, especially over his daughters? For the world expects the sons of a man to rebel from his authority, but the daughters must always obey.

When she was old enough, Nerena realized that though her father loved her, perhaps because she was an extension of himself, this love was not truly respect. Her father didn't respect her; and so, in due course, his respect became the one thing in the world she wanted above anything else. His respect was the one thing she would have done anything to earn, and it became the focus of her life. It was through her father's denying her this respect that she became willingly submissive; to offend, insult, or disappoint him would have forever eradicated the possibility of obtaining his approval.

Nerena never stopped to wonder if his judgment was more valid than her own.

As a young lady, Nerena came to know her mother didn't love her. She knew it, and it hurt.

Nerena knew also that her mother had an insensate soul, a soul inured to the feelings of others. Whether this had always been the case or not, she didn't know, but it was certainly true now.

Even before Nerena's grand introduction to the elite society of Seynorynael as an adult, Nalya showed no maternal affection in preparing her child for the eyes of the world and left the duty of preparing and arranging Nerena's attire to Zadúmchov, who chose a Martial Scientific Force outfit for Nerena that singled her out among the entire company; Nerena felt out of her element as soon as she appeared at her own introductory ball.

"Please don't make me wear it," she remembered thinking when she saw the military outfit her father had chosen for her. Why not a dress? All of the other women would be wearing a dress to her "Introduction to Society" party. But she would do anything to please her father, including wearing a horrible uniform.

The party and those which followed meant that Nerena was obliged to mingle among the dull coquettes of the elite circle, eager and pious young women who had nothing valuable to say and whom Nerena had long despised. She had never imagined when she was young that the world was dull or that no one wanted to do anything, at least not what she saw might be possible with her lofty expectations of all that was possible in the greater world, this shining epicenter of the Federation that was Ariyalsynai, capital of the planet Seynorynael. Couldn't they go to other worlds and enact great laws or fight great battles against the Federation's enemies, the insurrectionist groups that appeared every now and again?

It seemed no one in the elite but Nerena wanted to do or admired any of these things. What they liked to do was to attend parties, and talk about them.

Nerena dutifully attended the successive parties held by the elite with her father, where she was to be introduced as the future "Great Coordinator", or more likely the mother of the next Great Coordinator, if Zadúmchov held his position throughout his lifetime, which was a more popular subject of debate than anything the Grand Marshall had done.

As for being a mother, Nerena didn't much care for that idea; unlike most women, she disliked infants in general but adored children. She seldom saw much beauty in the tiny, wrinkled things, but children were complete people to her. Why was it that the elite circle talked about nothing important? she wondered. Nerena came to hate the flashy affairs, the bustle of mindless activity, the talk and gossip before and after such events.

The parties themselves were always a profound disappointment; Nerena found the people insular and their conversation prosaic. Besides which, Nerena only pretended to know what she was doing. She had not really ever gotten used to the society events, despite her training and upbringing. Most of the women were bedizened in ornate-looking attire that had been created for one day's amusement; Nerena felt lonelier than she had ever been, but she kept up appearances for reasons beyond her own comprehension.

At the same time, Nerena begrudged the mediocrity of the world.

"I don't understand these summer trips to Firien. There's nothing to see," Nalya said, with an air of ennui, after the Grand Marshall mentioned he was planning on taking Nerena again to the Lake Firien Province when the warm season began—soon.

"I won't go with you." Nalya said flatly, and she refused to acquiesce. Nerena sat in disapproval as the Grand Marshall turned back to a discussion with his chief subordinate.

If her mother was so bored, so dissatisfied with her own life, why didn't she devise something new for a change? Nerena wondered. Why couldn't she see the interest in a trip to the remote province of Lake Firien?

Nerena sat in abeyance, then stared at her mother.

"Forgive me, mother, but can't you try to enjoy yourself?" Nerena asked. Nalya sighed and got up without answering, then left.

Nerena turned to listen to her father's subordinate droning something about supply routes and trade embargoes, but his words were just details, details—she tried not to hear them. Putem, the subordinate, was the sort of man who knew the commercial value of everything he saw, but never saw its worth.

This was the first Nerena had heard of the Grand Marshall's idea to return to Firien for a substantial visit.

Back to Firien, again, after so long!

The family had gone to Lake Firien during the warm months for several years. Long ago, Zadúmchov had lived for two years in the small settlement of Firien City to take up a temporary post during the excavations of a nearby ruined vessel of the ancients. This posting had been many long years before Nerena was born. But Zadúmchov had liked Firien City after living there and the province of Lake Firien, and so had been determined to take his young daughter there on summer outings.

"I'll be packed by this afternoon," Nerena thought to herself when she found out they were going to Firien City this year.

Every year Nerena and her father swam, carried heavy tackle kits up to the bay and sat fishing for hours; Nerena made friends with the local children who played games on the docks, Firien children who didn't completely understand the significance of the name Zadúmchov. They sat until star's-rise spinning stories and dancing to music on the warm beach. Nerena played in bare feet on the sand, looking for chisk creatures buried in the sands and came home every day with sand and grit plastered on her legs.

There were no nannies, no tutors, only her father and herself, and occasionally even Nalya would come in the last few tendays of the summer season to enjoy the end-of-season festival Firien was so famous for. They went into Firien City on transports full of singing people, playing games and instruments of all kinds, some native to Firien, others from as far off as the planet Goeur.

And the hikes!

Some days, Zadúmchov even packed up supplies for a day of hiking and hunting; they shot wild ilaia for meat and camped high on the mountains, fending off delochs with fires and soundflares, but Nerena wasn't afraid as long as her father the General, the Grand Marshall, was there.

It was wonderful there in Firien. Nerena spent afternoons climbing trees until her legs were scratchy and filthy with damp lyra leaves, climbing trees with the local boys until her mother appeared at the end of the season, proclaimed her a hoyden and put an end to the activity; afterwards, Nerena invited the local girls to their summer dwelling, where they swam and made Bilirian cream cakes, but Nerena snuck out at night to join the boys in skipping stone contests. By the time she was half-grown, Nerena had had her first kiss with a rough-cheeked boy she palled around with every year; everyone called him "Dusty"—he had, however, washed for the occasion.

Then there was the mysterious man that the gang called "rainbow man" who was reputed to live over by the north shore; Dusty spun eerie tales about him at night over a beach-fire, and they laughed and screamed at any sudden sound and hid under the blanket they had brought. Then they compared foot sizes and read palms, had slapping and staring contests, and went running like hooligans out onto the beach in the middle of the night, with ideas of scouting out the area and finding this mysterious rainbow man. They had never found him, but Nerena came back home scratched up, with leaves and twigs strung through her hair.

She was convinced there was no such person as the rainbow man.

For years now, the family had stopped coming to the summer dwelling, when Nerena's studies and the Grand Marshall's duties kept them away in the warm season.

Nerena had since grown up, finished training to one day take over as "Coordinator of the Expansion" and even trained to become a member of the Martial Scientific Force. It was then, that one afternoon, that her father told her and Nalya that he had been called out to Firien on business.

And, he was thinking of spending the approaching warm season there; he had even managed to procure Nerena a temporary release from duty to study his dealings as the Great Coordinator.

For the first time in years, she wondered what had happened to Dusty.

"Oh father, look! I can see the Lake from here on the left—see there through the clearing in the trees. How much longer until we get there?" Nerena Zadúmchov leaned forward to get a better view through the transport window.

"Not long, Nerena." Grand Marshall Zadúmchov laughed at his daughter's effusive zeal.

Nerena's mother Nalya had as usual been detained in Ariyalsynai, which meant that she had no intention of coming at all, but the Grand Marshall had insisted that she make an appearance at some point during the season. Nalya had agreed merely for appearance's sake.

Zadúmchov had been so preoccupied with his thoughts that he was surprised to find that the transport had arrived at their usual vacation dwelling.

"I'm going to take a walk, father," Nerena said and hopped out of the transport as though she couldn't wait to be moving again.

Nerena had almost decided against coming on the trip to Firien this year, but she didn't tell her father the real reason she had made up her mind to go. Several months before she had been working late hours on a project and had not returned home until late at night. On her way to the transport shuttle, she thought she saw someone standing in the shadows behind the Research building, his face obscured, watching her.

Time and again she had felt the presence of someone following her, watching her, always from a distance, always hidden. Once she was sure she had heard footsteps behind her and turned around to confront her second shadow, but there had been no one, only the empty streets between the transports and the sound of a few leaves scratching the walkways, swirling.

Nerena had decided to leave the capital of Ariyalsynai when the intruder suddenly disappeared. Nerena convinced herself that it must have only been her active imagination, but she had already agreed she would go on the annual trip to Lake Firien. Once committed to the vacation, she surprised herself by just how anxious she was to get there.

As she walked, Nerena lost herself in listening to the waves on the shore and in the strong sea wind accented by the cries of small kiri birds with here and there a tall, long-legged ceiras bird diving for fish at the water's edge. Nerena was soon lost in sunburnt memories of golden days long gone. Her long hair lashed about her face, and she pulled strands from her eyes, but her senses were overcome by the wild, uncontrolled majesty of Firien, the most beautiful of the provinces.

"It's so lovely out here," she thought to herself. She felt free in this land beyond the weather-safe ring. The wonders, the hint of danger, with no perfectly controlled safety dome to protect her reminded her that she was alive, that the world held all possibilities.

Nerena's gaze drifted between the wide sea on her left and the stretch of the lyra tree forest that bordered the lake on her right as she walked along. After a long moment contemplating Dusty and the strange people he said had once lived in Firien's lyra forest, people called "proto-telepaths" whether there was any truth to the rumors about them or not, Nerena looked up again and saw a man in the distance where no one had been a moment before. As Nerena peered ahead, she saw that he was staring at her.

"Sir?" she called, but no one returned her call.

Who was he? she wondered, suddenly noticing that this strange man might not be Seynorynaelian.

No—Dusty had been right!

The shock set in, but it wouldn't be shaken off.

The stranger's hair would have been silver, like the color reflected in Lake Firien under cloudy skies, if he stood still. When he moved, and he was moving towards her now, she caught a bare reflection of bright color that vacillated from one to another in a hypnotic manner. She found she couldn't stop being fascinated by it.

Her heart beat faster as she realized he was coming towards her. What was he? Was he dangerous?

His movements were easy, fluid. She noticed, numbly, even afraid, perhaps simply because he wasn't afraid at all.

These thoughts struck her before she had a chance to prevent them. He was in no way effeminate but she found his movement beautiful, a stunning masculine grace.

She couldn't flee, couldn't move. Besides, he was too close already to escape the meeting; she was so highly conscious of propriety. Now she saw the color of his eyes: like clear blue water, the green light of the trees, the violet of the sunset, the silver-golden glints of the sun. The multi-colors flickered in his eyes hypnotically, preventing her from looking away.

Hadn't Dusty said this strange man haunted the lake shore? Hadn't he been here several years even before her childhood—

But could it be him? This man looked young.

"Are you lost?" he asked. She struggled to understand a moment; his words were accented, melodious; he didn't speak like her, but he didn't sound like a foreigner.

"No," she stuttered. Get away, Nerena—her mind told her.

She ignored the thought.

"I'm Nerena," she said, finding her voice. "Forgive me if I've intruded here, but I was enjoying the lake..."

"The lake belongs to all, Nerena." The man said. "But my house lies there—in a clearing in the trees." He pointed to the right, at a bend in the lake ahead, to the shore that looked north instead of west. "You've walked a good stretch, Nerena, if you came from Firien City."

Nerena looked at the sun above and realized she had been walking most of the day. If she did not head back soon, her father would be worried about her.

"Don't worry. The transport stop isn't far from here. I can take you back to the city and have you home well before star's-rise."

"I can walk."

"Even if you set back now, you won't make it before late evening. Lake Firien is not quite the wildest lands to the East, but there have been delochs not far from here."

"Delochs? But—"

"Yes. They seem to stay clear of the forest, but I wouldn't feel safe allowing you to take any chance—"

"Very well, sir. I thank you for your consideration, and I will accept your offer—but only if you would take me as far as the city. I should be able to find my way home from there—"

She stopped herself, and then she agreed to go with him.

"Haven't I taught you anything?" Grand Marshall Zadúmchov bellowed. "You can't trust an alien!" And it was clear from his tone that he considered them all inferior.

"Trust him?" Nerena laughed. "It's too late for that kind of advice. I've already agreed to stay here."

Zadúmchov's face seemed to swell with rage.

"Remind her of her duty, Nalya," Zadúmchov said quietly, controlling his temper.

"Let me talk to her for a minute alone." Nalya said woodenly; she had just arrived at the end of the warm season.

"Only for a minute," Zadúmchov agreed and left the room, in case he allowed his temper to get the better of him.

Nerena's mother had arrived after two tendays into the warm season, and the family had been living in their vacation dwelling for eleven tendays. They had planned to depart the next tenday before the warm weather season ended, before the cold weather began.

Nerena had spent most of her time with the man she had once known as rainbow man; he was no longer a mystery to her. They had become companions at first, then she had grown to care for him, and then she had loved him for his kindness. He knew so much about the Federation worlds, and they had spoken of many things throughout the summer.

How could she tell her parents what made her love this man? He cared nothing for amassing Federal currency, nothing for power, politics, or reputation; he was not greedy but confident in his love for the land; he didn't let any inanimate thing of the tangible world disturb his sense of peace. He seemed to know so much more than she did, even as an alien living in a rural land.

Something in her told her he was a loner—but he had been willingly caught. Why? As strange as their rapport was to the Grand Marshall and Nalya, Nerena felt more connected to the rainbow man than anyone in her life, even after so short a time.

Nalya saw her daughter's expression and interpreted it easily. This young man Nerena had fallen in love with might otherwise have been suitable for her daughter—she didn't know him, to be fair, and she cared very little outside what it might mean to the family reputation—no, she amended inwardly, she had even ceased to care about that. But he was an alien, after all, and Zadúmchov still cared. She was irritated at Nerena for putting her in this position—Nerena should have known better.

"He's an alien." Said Nalya in a disapproving tone. "And you know what that means."

Nerena said nothing, but she knew.

For one thing, Zadúmchov was always being sent away to discuss plans to quell the small civil rebellions. Nerena knew that many of the aliens on Seynorynael who had joined the Federation since the explorers had made contact with them had been causing trouble for the Martial Scientific Force.

Aside from her husband's misgivings, Nalya would allow that only a small percentage of the aliens on Seynorynael were trouble-makers. Many had become respectable citizens. And the Kayrians and Tulorians were practically Seynorynaelian, with the exception of a few of their customs. But there was their social standing to be considered. How could Nerena shame the family by attaching herself to an alien—an unknown vagrant from one of the provinces? The remote, Firien province no less?

"Now, Nerena, do you know anything about this young man? Has he told you who his people are and where he came from?"

"I don't know." Nerena shook her head. "He says he's lived at Firien since the last census."

"That was nineteen years ago," Nalya liked this less and less.

"Other than that, I don't know where he's lived."

"What is his name?" Nalya asked frankly, but Nerena blushed.

"Enassa was the name on his collar—so he said. I couldn't read it."

"Is he Kayrian?" Nalya asked optimistically, but Nerena shook her head.

"No, nor Tulorian. I couldn't say what he is—he doesn't look like any alien I've ever seen before."

Nalya sighed. "You didn't ask him who his people were? For creator's sake, Nerena, he could be part Berrachaiyan. Or from Ephor—"

"He isn't. Don't you think with my training I should know what he is? Since I don't, I hardly think he's a part of any of the alien conspiracies."

"But if he doesn't even trust you enough to tell you about himself—"

"No, mother, it isn't that at all. I didn't want to know. It doesn't matter to me what he is."

Nerena had realized something; being famous and one of the elite had never helped her through her life. Nerena had never known before in her adult life if someone liked her for herself or because she was famous or wealthy. She was still lost, still searching for a clue as to what she was doing, and the big answer book hadn't fallen out of the sky yet.

The alien man known as Enassa didn't even know who her family was, and he didn't care.

Nevertheless, he had been able to love her and even to respect her. They had spent many evenings talking late into the night, listening to the chisk animals singing softly with the wind. He had lifted a weight off her soul she didn't know she was carrying. And she felt as though she had finally woken up, woken up and realized that she had been asleep all her life.

"Of course, you should know that the Grand Marshall will cut you off if you insist upon attaching yourself to this alien."

"Then let him," Nerena said soberly, but to Nalya's surprise, she showed no sign of cowing to the threat.

"It's your decision," Nalya said, suddenly admiring the integrity in Nerena's eyes. There was a nobility there that could not be taught. Why had she never seen it before? Social standings could fall or be raised by accident or luck—but Nerena was happy. Wasn't that more important?

She felt a vague sensation of feeling for her daughter, but it was too late in this life for her to call it love.

"What if he should abandon you? What if he knows who you are and only wants to use you or hurt you?"

"I have faith in him." Nerena protested.

"Faith is cheap. Suffering endures, my dear." Nalya said.

Nerena flinched. "When the warm season ends, I suppose I won't be able to return with you."

"Think of your career, Nerena—"

"I don't care."

"You could do better," Nalya summoned the energy for one final attack.

Nerena just glared at her. She refused to even acknowledge such a comment.

Nalya's ice-hard expression began to melt.

"I can see that nothing I can say is going to change your mind." Nalya shook her head. "But for your sake, I hope your father is wrong and that you are right."

And then she wondered at the irony; for the first time, Nalya realized she was proud of her daughter.

Chapter Two

What was Ariyalsynai? City of wonders, city of beauty, city of the elite, and city of the forgotten.

The capital of Seynorynael, Ariyalsynai, was a terribly beautiful city, but full of evil and ruin, the ruin of man. "Star mountain", "white mountain"—Ariyal-synai was a pretentious city that had become the gateway to the stars.

The boy was crying in desperation, out of hunger.

The earliest moments of his life were but a wash of colors, sights that seemed blurred. When he remembered back upon his earliest memories, he often wondered why the sounds were missing. Memories—by the time he was able to retain them, the events that would have illuminated the reasons for the condition he was in were as far gone as last year's city-wide trash pile.

He had no memory of his mother's face left to him, but her voice was the one sound that lingered in his earliest recollections when he turned off his senses, senses that responded to the outside world, so that he could drift in his own consciousness. Sometimes, this was the only way to get through the day.

He was four long Seynorynaelian years old.

For as long as he remembered, he had survived on whatever he could find: rotten trash left about by careless people picnicking by the artificial rivers in the city parks, handouts from people on the streets unnerved by the ravenous expression in his eyes, scraps the other vagrant people kindly sacrificed to the beggar-child who, like them, lived at the mercy of fortune and prey to the whims of chance.

When he had grown older, he had found he could sneak into public buildings and pilfer small items from the food replication units; after a time, he learned to wait until nightfall to pilfer the sherin and other alimentary fruit-bearing orchards in the city arboretums; he lived by whatever means necessary, glutting himself when opportunity presented itself, while other times he went for days without food.

Ravenous hunger was the fundamental component of his reality. He was incapable of imagining a world in which there was no hunger, no pain, no endless foraging and sleeping to conserve energy when at last his thin, frail body succumbed to exhaustion.

He would eat anything, regardless of taste.

For the longest time, he didn't understand the most fundamental principles of life. He didn't understand the smiles so many of the people wore; the expression simply had no recognizable meaning for him. He knew that at one point he hadn't been in his present condition, that someone had spoken to him, told him stories, laughed with him—there was a dim recollection beyond his misery that he had once been content.

He didn't know that he must have been cared for, not very long ago. The pants he wore hung loosely about him from the waist down but halted at his calf. His body swam within a thin worn shirt with sleeves that reached just past his elbows. He had no shoes. Then, at one point, one of the local vagrants who lived under the shadow of the aqueduct took pity on him and called the child over; the boy cast suspicious, nervous glances and refused to go, until the vagrant chased him and swept him up in thin, sinewy arms.

The boy screamed like mad, but there was no one to hear. He didn't know that this vagrant had taken pity on the child who lived wild in a sophisticated city where flotillas of spaceships docked in the astroports. The vagrant fed him, took care of him for a while, acquired larger, ragged clothing for him, taught him where the best food could be gathered around the city, spoke to him, and in time the child learned that he had a voice. From that point on, he began to listen to the world around him.

He was with the vagrant when they heard the public announcements, and the beggar was there to explain the meaning to him. He listened to the man, learned from him, and in time, he began to know what the city was, how it operated, what it thought.

When the vagrant man died, the boy cried real tears for the first time. He was there hiding behind the canal when the regular humanroid city-sweepers carted the body off to be incinerated. Thereafter, the boy wandered the city alone.

The people stared at him, eyes full of horror. Others ignored him, moved aside to keep from being contaminated by his filth. He had long since become indifferent to the itch of his body under clothes filthy and worn. When he encountered other children, he hid away from them and watched, moon-eyed, feeling as distant from their play as from a dream. On the street, though, the children always pointed at him. He often perched in shadows to observe the people on the street, and he listened to them, learned their natures by heart. The people said that there was a place for everyone—who was this beggar child and what was he doing when he could go to any ectogenesis center and be taken care of by the state?

Who was he—when every child born in the city had been monitored since birth? There simply were no cracks in the system—so why was he bothering them? And they looked at him as though he had asked for what he got, and gotten what he deserved.

If there was a place for everyone, the boy wondered, his mind beginning to understand what they meant, why wasn't there a place for him? Why not him? Why had no one come to collect him and take him to this warm place where he could be fed and cared for? What had he done? How could what they said be true, he thought in anguish, if he were wandering alone, through the cracks in the system, not even knowing where he'd come from or who his family had been?

What they were telling him was that he didn't exist.

He learned many things from what he heard, but he also knew just how much of what he heard wasn't true.

I may be poor, he thought, but I am not nothing!

And then one day, the city regulators at last caught up with the boy who wandered the streets.

"Hey there, boy! Stop!" They called, spying the child sitting by the river-back, knees drawn up. The boy turned his head, and clambered up, darting away, but the regulators fenced him in. Slowly they advanced upon him; there was nowhere to go. One of the sour-faced men reached out and grabbed him by the collar.

Of course, the regulators hadn't bothered to explain who they were to the child, or to tell him that they meant him no harm and would take him where he could be cared for. The boy only knew that he had been surrounded unawares and attacked. For all he knew, they might beat him or drag him to his death.

So he kicked and screamed, struggling as the large regulator dragged him towards a transport.

"Ouch! This little bugger bit me, Kfuia!" The man holding him cursed.

"Maybe you should try the other end." Kfuia laughed.

The regulator holding him tried to grab the boy's ankles and turn him upside-down.

"This brat's a wild animal!" He screeched a moment later, as the boy flailed his arms in desperation.

The boy stopped struggling then and let them take him, his young heart bursting with anger and anguish.

He was no wild animal!

They shoved him into the back of the transport. It was dark inside; the regulators hadn't even bothered to turn on the lights for the child. Instead, they had thrown him into the transport like a deloch.

He fell asleep to escape the pain. When he woke up, they had brought him to an inculcation center for the abandoned children created by ectogenesis, or, artificial births in artificial placentas.

The regulators brought him into a gleaming white building so tall that it seemed to merge with the sun high above. They left him in a wide entryway, standing before a group of adults wearing canary-colored uniforms. The boy was too preoccupied scanning his environment for a possible escape to listen to the explanation the regulators gave the center staff before they returned to their transport.

"What's your name, boy?" asked a sallow-faced, middle-aged man hunched like a miser behind a small, half-open panel before him.

The boy turned to him, but his gaze drifted back towards the left-side door.

"Did you hear me, boy, I said what is your name?" The man bellowed this time; the boy shivered but stood his ground. He was now looking the man directly in the eye.

Meanwhile, the boy tried to think back. What had that voice, his mother's voice, once called him?

"Fielikor." He said proudly, alighting upon the answer. Later in his life, he came to know that this had been the name of a famous nobleman in ancient history before the Federation; at the time, he was pleased that he had managed to say in it one breath.

"Well, prince Fielikor," the man said facetiously, to a chorus of chuckles and laughter all around, "have you got a family name?"

Fielikor eyed the man, setting his dirty chin proudly. He said nothing for a moment.

"Well?" The man demanded. "We ain't got all day."

"Kiel," the boy blurted at last.

The man stared at him, his watery eyes vaguely unsettled. "Ain't never heard that one before. That's not a name by itself, that isn't. That's an ending. What's the full name, boy?"

Fielikor refused to speak; he hadn't exactly known what he was doing until he said it, but now he wouldn't have taken it back for the world. Later in his life, he came to realize that the name he had chosen was so plain as to grant him anonymity; it was a root contained in so many other names across the planet.

The boy only knew that the moment he had spoken it, it had made him feel as though he truly had a family out there, without denying the reality of his solitary life thus far.

The sallow-faced man shrugged, but he put down the name as "Kiel", carefully spelled so as not to confuse it with a name ending of "keil" or "kil".

And then they sent him up for sanitation.

Kiel felt as though he had descended into purgatory, though he only had a vague concept of what purgatory was supposed to be. The humanroids had stripped him naked roughly and sent him through the sterilizing spray of chemically treated water; they waited for the cycle of purification to finish, oblivious to his cries. The air cycle extinguished the sound as Kiel was enveloped for several moments, until he was quite dry.

Chafed, frightened, hoarse, and suffocating, but definitely dry. As the cycle ended, robotic arms fitted him with new white clothes that conformed closer to his body than any he had known; he was painfully thin for his age and height, but he didn't know it.

The humanroids took him from the sterilization center, sat him down on a panel and sheared his hair to a fingernail's space just above his ears. They waited beside him until a humanoid race attendant came for him to take him to the sleeping room where boys his own age lived past training hours and slept, in rows of ten by ten, on permanent sleeping boards, inside a giant, bare room; the technology of the facility later struck Kiel, who had snuck into and seen the inside of Federation lounges many times, as something quite primitive.

The humanoids left him among the other boys, who had woken up and eaten the morning meal but had yet to assemble for morning training. The boys gathered round the newcomer, but faced him with only silent stares until the attendant turned and headed away.

"My, my, who's this?" A thin-faced boy purred, sizing Kiel up with a long, critical glance up and down once the attendant was irretrievably gone. The boy was taller than Kiel, perhaps older, with a lazy-eyed glare; his eyes seemed perpetually half-shut, but the mind beneath was quick and vicious.

"What's your name?" The boy asked; he did all of the talking for the others.

"Fielikor."

"Fielikor what?"

"Fielikor Kiel."

"Well, Fielikor, I'm Corrdyr. Remember that. Corr-dyr. C-O— You do know how to spell, don't you?" He stared at Kiel, expecting him to cower or flinch.

Kiel stared back. "No."

"He doesn't know how to spell!" Corrdyr laughed, a taunting laugh. The others hooted and railed in kind.

"So how old are you, Kiel?" Corrdyr's voice silenced the others.

Kiel refused to answer; he shifted his feet, but said nothing.

"He doesn't know!" Corrdyr pronounced, then began crowing in delight. "You must be stupid, then. Are you stupid, Kiel?" He asked, narrowing his sleepy eyes on Kiel, eyes like a waning moon until they became mere slits.

Kiel glowered at Corrdyr. Am I really stupid? he thought to himself. Could it be true? He didn't know! Maybe he was stupid. But stupid or not, he wasn't going to let this Corrdyr know that he had wounded him.

"No." Kiel said quickly, defiantly.

"What's going on in here?" A thundering voice interrupted. Corrdyr had been circling, slowly closing in round Kiel's face, staring him down with all of the malevolent power he could muster, but the taller boy sheered off at the intrusion of the adult and drew back towards the other boys. They followed him with their eyes, forgetting Kiel.

"Nothing," the boys said in unison.

"Kiel doesn't know how to talk," one of the youngest boys piped up.

"He doesn't know how to spell," another corrected the first.

"Oh. Yeah." The first little boy considered, nodding.

Kiel didn't turn at the sound of the deeper voice. He faced the boys, still watching Corrdyr, still defiant of the animus of the taller boy. He would have stood there for all eternity if Corrdyr hadn't retreated.

"I think that'll be enough talking." The adult male voice behind Kiel declared in a tone of command. "Off to your studies, now, boys."

The boys obliged, heading single file to the doorway beyond on the far right side of the room, opposite the entrance; later Kiel came to know that this area was even larger than the present room, a place where a humanroid programmed with intelligence directed each boy's training at an information grid.

"Is it true, Kiel?" The man behind Kiel asked, drawing near. Kiel turned quickly, whirling on him like an injured animal.

The man's face was unreadable by most standards, but Kiel had developed an innate sense about people in his years alone, watching the people on the streets of Ariyalsynai, impressing their natures upon his young mind and storing the information to be used in defending himself if he ever needed it.

The man was tall, stout, and robust, thick-boned and middle-aged, with wrinkles near his eyes and a look of subdued wisdom about him.

Kiel just glowered at him. The man watched him, but he did not smile.

"Well then, Kiel, you'll just have to learn."

Kiel's face hardened, but inside he was afraid. "I don't know how to learn. It's too late, isn't it?" He ventured.

The man shook his head, then eyed the boy with a keen, steady gaze. "No, I don't think so, Kiel. But you're the only one who can decide if it's too late for you to learn or not."

"I don't want to be stupid." Kiel said, fighting off hurt. "I want to know how to spell."

The man eyed him studiously, a small, tight smile working onto his face.

"Then I'll teach you."

Three seasons had passed, and Kiel prospered at the facility with the help of the instructor, Jinderian. Jinderian, it turned out, had no official duty at the center; he was merely an attendant, like so many others, one of the few humans at the center, and had been delegated to the impotent role of wandering and monitoring the facility when the army of humanroids were brought to the center to replace the original instructors. Jinderian took it upon himself to help the young boy Kiel; the center staff approved of the mentorship. They considered Kiel unruly and hopelessly, irreparably incorrigible, considering the wild character and origin of the child.

Kiel and Corrdyr continued their battle of wills. At times it seemed as though one or the other had begun to bend; Corrdyr maintained his influence over the other young boys of the center, and the balance most often leaned in his favor, but Kiel refused to break.

Corrdyr devised several rites of passage for the newcomer, Kiel. Corrdyr and his minions tried to trip Kiel frequently, spat in his food, pulled away his seat when he was about to sit down, poured water on his sleeping panel and alerted the attendants, pinned Kiel down and beat him when he refused to admit that he hadn't taken their collection of Martial Scientific Force emblems. They hurled the eternal boyhood rites of passage against him, but Kiel was far too stubborn to concede defeat. Kiel remained himself, and in time, they began to ignore him. Kiel had won the battle for now; yet he remained suspicious of Corrdyr and ever-alert for signs of new hostility.

Meanwhile, Kiel was learning, learning quickly.

Jinderian kept to his word, and Kiel learned to read and spell, not only in Seynorynaelian, but he also learned snatches of Kayrian. Kiel learned to read slowly at first, after an entire season of tedious effort; then one day, his rate of learning accelerated. Jinderian couldn't say when exactly it began to happen, but he saw that Kiel had approached learning with the same sense of suspicion that he approached everything in his life. Even after three seasons, the boy remained suspicious of others, mistrustful, always alert for danger and deception.

Jinderian had come to care for the boy, why he didn't know. Perhaps it was the teacher in him that wanted to tame the wild, unruly heart of a boy ever-resistant to change, but that wasn't all. Jinderian saw that Kiel was able to learn quickly once he had worked it out that the training was for his own betterment; and the boy was quick. Jinderian responded to Kiel's eagerness to learn as any instructor with a shining pupil. Jinderian came to believe in the boy's potential, not merely as a matter of faith or hope. He saw it, recognized it, and perhaps that was why he couldn't give up on the child.

"You have great love for it," said Jinderian one day.

"Sir?"

"Learning. This is a good thing," laughed Jinderian.

At the same time, Jinderian feared that Kiel's character was beyond correction. He feared that Kiel would be sundered forever from his fellow man, unable to register a reality outside his own melancholy, narrow world. Kiel understood survival, but the child had no concept of pleasure or goodness, or kindness—Jinderian hadn't given up entirely, though, and continued to show Kiel such kindness and patience as he could; yet he feared that Kiel would never understand that people cared for him, that one being was even capable of caring for another, of putting another's needs up there alongside his own.

Three seasons after his arrival, Kiel was still no closer to understanding this, and Jinderian was beginning to lose heart; nevertheless, Jinderian could see small signs of progress; chief among these was that Kiel no longer distanced himself from Jinderian. Kiel trusted Jinderian as far as he could allow himself to trust anyone.

Jinderian continued reading the astrophysics printvolume as Kiel stood and stretched to take a break.

"I'm just going to get some hot acaia juice," said Kiel.

"And bring one for me as well, would you, dear boy?" said Jinderian.

"Yes, sir." Kiel hurried back with the drinks, and they continued to study.

Kiel enjoyed all subjects equally, but Jinderian thought the boy regarded them with suspicion, as though he dared not believe anything he was told unless it were to be disproved and taken away from him the next day. He learned it out of curiosity only, but he questioned everything he learned.

One afternoon, Jinderian abruptly laughed as he read the volume, his small eyes agleam with satisfaction. Wouldn't this interest his pupil! he thought to himself.

"Come here, Fielikor, and read this." Jinderian managed to sound nonchalant as he called from his position monitoring the instructors' holo-field, distracting the young boy gazing out the silica screen at the transports swarming by in the city outside.

Fielikor came willingly, bounding over with a level-eyed expression.

Jinderian pointed, followed Kiel's eyes towards it, and sat back as the boy read.

"...and the explorers passed by 'Kiel', the pole star, the light that shines in the constellation Attorea..." Kiel stopped, turning wondering eyes to Jinderian. Could this be true? the eyes wondered, daring, hoping, wanting to believe.

Jinderian smiled.

"You see, Fielikor," Jinderian said in triumph, "you have taken a name that will bear much striving to live up to."

"Why?"

"Because it is the pole star that once lead the ancient ships of Seynorynael to cross Lake Firien and the Kilkoran Sea. And it is the pole star that leads our spaceships to the 'centipede' star gate near Kai-rek. The light of the pole star is the space navigator's guide, even when all of his other instruments have failed."

Kiel said nothing, but for the first time, Jinderian saw the words enter the child's soul.

The warm season began, with its festive air. Corrdyr and the children began talking of the annual festivals that the city held to celebrate the coming of the warm season. Kiel listened to the talk while he sat at his inculcation center, indifferent, as the humanroid droned on about ancient Kayrian traditions.

Kiel pretended not to hear the others; to acknowledge that he was listening to their conversation usually invited a confrontation, and Kiel had no desire to fight today. Jinderian had gone to tour the lai-nen Science Exhibit on his free day of the tenday. Kiel kept wondering what the souvenir Jinderian had promised would turn out to be; he had little enough experience to imagine what it might be.

"Let's go outside the dome and enjoy the weather," said one of the children near Corrdyr, ignoring the efforts of the humanroid instructors to keep them settled in their stations.

Kiel paid them all no attention. He saw little difference in the seasons here in the domed city; he had never before known the outside world. The closest to his understanding of seasons was the slight drop in temperature within the dome in the coldest season. The dome monitors produced artificial light to automatically augment the light of Valeria, keeping it at a constant.

The trees in the ordinary arboretums produced fruit through all seasons, as Kiel remembered from his childhood; the Arboretum Museum of all trees preserved against extinction, with samples taken from across the Federation, was off limits to non-elite citizens, but Kiel had once passed by and crept under the main barrier towards the crystalloid casing. Crawling under the external foliage of the outside arboretum, he had been able to peer inside, his face down by the ground; he peered in at the haunting silence of it, this beautiful place untouched and serene, with its wide twisting paths and arching canopies.

This must be heaven, he had thought.

Kiel had wanted more than anything to be able to crawl inside and sleep there, among the boughs of those undying silver-gold trees nearest him. Kiel found out later that there was even an artificial breeze in the Arboretum Musuem, and that it was completely detached from the noise and bustle of the rest of Ariyalsynai. But outside the dome? He had no concept of what was really out there, no matter what he learned at his inculcation center. The pictures did little to stir him, even in the holo-fields; he mistrusted them. After all, any picture could be altered so easily to entice summer tourists. He wasn't a fool. He knew about picture-tampering.

"Time to sleep for an hour," said one of the instructors to some of the younger children. Kiel and the older boys didn't have to. Kiel was still thinking and not listening to anyone.

Kiel had no concept of the seasons, of the environment; as a result, he had but a vague notion of time. For all he learned about it, the passing of a year, even the growth of his body, meant little to him. He thought about the future only when obliged to, as a rule; he understood fully the unpredictable nature of all that was around him. The future was no exception.

"Look at that!" said one of Corrdyr's friends.

The parades appeared in the transmission field. It seemed that the entire city outside was engaged in celebrating the successful implementation of the Great Coordinator's last expansion program, this time a full assimilation of the planet Pilasnaf.

Kiel watched the noble figure seated in honor in the parade turn aside to acknowledge the crowd, and he felt a pang of jealousy. Who was this man? Why was he so important?

The Grand Marshall, General Zadúmchov, Great Coordinator of the Expansion... the broadcaster wouldn't allow the audience to forget who he was.

Kiel decided not to watch; he turned his head back to his studies. Some time later, a tumultuous sound was heard. All of the boys stopped their talk and activity, their gazes and attention instantly drawn to the holo-field.

The scene had descended into madness. The crowd was pushing closer to the General, uncontrolled, a surging tide imbued with the ravaging power of hysteria.

The children watched in horror as the trampling began. Hundreds, thousands—people were pushed indifferently under the masses hoping, striving to see the Grand Marshall. Agonized screams wafted distinct above the general roar of the madding crowd. Suddenly, armies of humanroid regulators flooded the scene to restore the order; after some time, the tide was stemmed, leaving trampled bodies in the path of the parade.

It took several hours for word to reach the center that Jinderian had been crushed to death before the steps of the lai-nen Exhibit.

Kiel refused to believe the news at first, but when Jinderian didn't return the next day, the horror of it sank in.

"I hate the elite." Kiel said abruptly that afternoon, his mind turning over names like Gildran, Myandera, Kanossi, Pelapesse, Zadúmchov, yes especially Zadúmchov. "They don't deserve what they have."

"That's blasphemy. You'd better take that back." Corrdyr hurled from nearby.

"Why should I?" Kiel demanded.

For a moment, Corrdyr seemed to struggle with his words.

"Ah, what does your opinion matter, anyway?" He laughed. "If I were Zadúmchov, I wouldn't care what some dirty little worthless beggar thought."

Kiel clenched his fist, then took a deep breath to control his temper. He was glad he had learned to control it; it was so much easier to survive if he kept his emotions under control.

Jinderian, where was Jinderian? As long as his instructor had been there, Kiel had felt the power of Jinderian's faith like a secret aegis against the brutality and callousness of the world. Now, he thought, there was no one left to believe in. He wasn't sure he could believe in anyone again.

After all, hadn't Jinderian left him, as his mother had, as the vagrant had so long ago? Kiel scarcely knew it, but he didn't believe in hope. Hope had no practical use, no specified utility for him.

He only knew that he couldn't stay there without Jinderian, alone against the unchanging hostility of Corrdyr, who would never accept him as anything more than a worthless little beggar.

With a flash of insight, Kiel realized that he didn't want to stay down all his life, and that he could fight, even if he never really had a chance to fight his way past adversity; it didn't matter what happened. The fight was all. Yes, and he was going to do something to change his lot, even if he had no hope of success.

Because no matter what happened to him, something deep down kept telling him, "You are worth something, Kiel. Remember that."

He escaped from the center that evening when all the lights went out.

"I am going to make my life better." Kiel thought, and his mind was set in determination.

Kiel already knew how to fend for himself, but after two years living at the center, he now had a better idea of what he had to do in his life. He was going to learn, not just what the center wanted him to know, information to produce a good citizen, but about what made a great man. Jinderian had often gone to the exhibits, and frequently to the archives; Kiel remembered the information Jinderian brought back from these places above all the other things Jinderian had taught him.

And now that Kiel knew how to read, he was no longer estranged from the world he saw, as he had been but two years before. He knew where to go to find out what he wanted to know, and nothing was holding him back.

Out of necessity, he returned to his old ways; oh how easily they came back to him! No longer as small or thin, he couldn't wriggle past security gates or climb under fences as well, but he knew how to slip into the elite buildings, where to look for food units, and yes, he even returned to the arboretums.

Kiel saw no obstacle in theft, mostly because the food was provided for free to all of the patrons of the training and science centers, and he looked upon himself as a future patron and traveler in the Federation astroport. He had no qualms about taking what he needed for all the food that lay around abandoned and wasted by the greedy, bored, or gluttonous; he thought to himself that poverty and despair were far worse crimes against humankind than what he was doing to survive.

"Jinderian, what would you do?" he would often begin to think to himself.

Kiel knew he could have stayed at the training center for the ectogenetically grown orphans, but that was a technicality. The reason he could not stay was that, even though he was only a child, he had already come to know the invaluable worth of freedom; for to remain at the center would only have accomplished the slow strangling death of his spirit. And was his spirit less valuable than his body?

In time, however, as Kiel began to read away afternoons in the archives buildings, or sitting in the public science centers, a growing doubt formed in the back of his mind.

He didn't want to be forced to take anything not freely given to him, to take anything he hadn't earned!

This new philosophy only pained him, because he was a human animal and could not survive without food, and he was too young to acquire it any other way than by pilfering it. So he settled the issue by promising himself that he would replace the food someday when he could.

"Yes, Jinderian, I will repay them and others for your kindness to me."

Gradually, however, Kiel put thoughts of the orphans' inculcation center behind him. The warm season ended, and the cold seasons began and passed. Kiel's clothes grew tight, tattered, and threadbare; he knew that the information centers would soon stop letting him in the way he looked. He kept clean by bathing in the parks and fountains at night, and in the aqueduct he remembered.

The vagrants there no longer knew him; his clothes were ragged, but not nearly as ragged as theirs. Kiel had been possessed of some foresight when he left the orphans' center, and had brought a small bag of belongings with him, including a larger pair of clothing, but now that too had worn out. He had but one pair of shoes, but they were made of shenchiri and wouldn't wear out, yet they had grown unbearably tight and gave him blisters by his ankles that opened and stung.

Kiel grew ill late in the third season away from the orphans' center and nestled himself with his tiny blanket under the aqueduct, racked by shivering and a horrible ache in his muscles that pained him just to breathe; for a time, he was certain he would die there under the shadow of the aqueduct as the vagrant who had cared for him had. Then the worst was over, and he found he could tolerate the light, walking short steps, and finally, after some time, he was able to stand and search out food.

"God, is it cold," he thought, picking himself up and hiding his blanket under some trees. Of course, it wasn't that cold, it was only his perception.

By then he had grown ravenous and no longer cared about where he obtained nourishment. He found a sherin orchard but ate only a part of one piece, so weakened from his illness that he couldn't stomach any more.

He left the orchard and decided never again to return to the aqueduct.

It was at that point that Kiel discovered the science center where boys a few years older than he trained for entrance into higher learning centers.

The trainees took no notice of the gaunt, hollow-eyed young boy aimlessly wandering about their forum; perhaps he was a sibling of one of the charity trainees. Kiel came across a kind young man, who bestowed a coat upon him, took him inside a training room and fed him some food sent by a family member, gave him an extra set of clothes and also gave over his sleep panel to the near-starved boy for the afternoon, but by evening, the trainees were returning to their rooms, and Kiel hurried to leave before he could be noticed.

"I love this place," he thought to himself.

Kiel remained by the science center for some time and mingled freely among the trainees, even in their archives and study centers. No one noticed him as he wore the large, overgrown trainee uniform given to him. Kiel ate with the trainees in the free dining halls, drifted among them, but he was always on the periphery. He had to stay on the periphery so they would never know he didn't belong. He seldom watched them play the games they played in the forum. Would it do him any good to observe, when he knew he couldn't join in or else risk exposure?

He kept close by the center for nearly a year as he grew into the trainee clothes; gradually he wondered if anyone at the archives would discover him, that he wasn't really one of the deserving trainees.

Because for all intents and purposes, he was one anyway. He went to large assemblies and listened to discussions, and he studied harder than any in the cubicles. Gradually an idea began to dawn on him—could he perhaps make it into a real training program on what he had learned?

He was almost too overwhelmed to try. He didn't know if his knowledge was sketchy, missing in fundamentals here and there. But he was tired of the deception. He had grown to hate deception, even though his own was necessary for his survival.

Then he overheard the other trainees talking about a glorious, renowned science center, the Federation Science Building, the pinnacle of all scientific training centers, where they were headed to take examinations.

Kiel decided this was his opportunity, and he wasn't going to miss it.

Thousands of trainees from across the planet Seynorynael and even some from the off-world colonies arrived in the sprawling complex of the Federation Science Building. The main courtyard, to whose access was usually forbidden to outsiders, swarmed with trainee groups. Kiel kept to the people wearing uniforms like himself and was taken to a testing room with them, until he realized his name wouldn't be in the computers. For some reason, he hadn't thought about that before.

He allowed himself to drift back, away from the others and into the milling crowds. What could he do?

He left the center and sat down on the grass in the courtyard. Someone walked by much later.

"What are you doing here?" A sharp-faced man was looking hard at him.

"I—"

"Don't you know you're supposed to be in the center taking the examination?"

"Well—"

"What's your name, boy?"

Kiel was silent. The man waited, then laughed.

"Don't think that silence will accomplish anything. A lot of effort has gone into arranging these exams for you, and you're going to take them, like it or not." He peered at Kiel's wrist. "Where's your identification?"

"I don't have one."

"Where did you hide it?"

"Nowhere."

The man grew irate and grabbed Kiel's arm, then dragged the boy inside, pinching into the bone.

He marched Kiel towards one of the sound-stations and threw him roughly down, then activated the testing device, punching in a number code to override the identification program. Then he left Kiel to himself, faced with the test.

Kiel stared it down. What was a test, anyway? Just a series of questions, problems; it had no power over whether or not he would live or die, did it?

Kiel punched in his name, Fielikor Kiel, then attacked the test with a sedulous fervor; he then waited where he was like the others, until the processing of the test was finished. The successful candidates were to stay at the center; the others would be leaving by transport in a few hours.

When the assessment flashed before him, Kiel stared numbly at it.

Miracle or not, he was there for good.

Kiel found himself assigned to a temporary training group under Commander Ilmaje of the Martial Scientific Force; he took the authorization band from the testing center where he had been sitting and headed out into the main hall, where the new trainees waited. After some time, an aide came to organize them into sections; Kiel followed blindly into Ilmaje's new group. He was directed to stand behind a long-haired girl wearing a dark navy uniform. The aide continued to arrange the rest of the trainees in columns.

"Hey, who are you?" She whispered after a moment.

"Me?" Kiel whispered back in shock, wondering how she knew he didn't belong. Was she psychic?

"I'm Paeleina." She said, turning aside to look at him. She had a round, pretty face with soft eyes and curled little lashes. "What's your name?"

"Kiel," He stuttered. She giggled.

"Kiel? As in the Pole Star? Or as in—you're not related to the Elder Marankeil, are you?" She wondered, her voice full of the enchantment of her own imagination. Kiel heard none of that; he was only defensive.

"No," he whispered back.

"Oh." She said in disappointment, drawing back a little. "So, have you thought about what division you want to train under?"

"Division?" Kiel didn't understand.

"Yes," she said, in a teasing way that indicated he should have known what she was saying; Kiel grew mildly annoyed by her tone, but he was too preoccupied by growing anxiety to let that be known. "I'm going to go in for radiology." She proclaimed. "That way I can be finished with flight training forever," she laughed in anticipation.

"What do you mean?" Kiel kept his question vague, hoping to draw more information out of her.

"Only the engineers, pilots, and navigators actually have to keep up their flight training, didn't you know that?" He shook his head. "They must not have prepared you very well at your last center." She peered at him. "Isn't that the uniform from the Ilas Academy?"

Kiel recognized the name. "Yes."

"Well, you should know all of this after three years at the Ilas Center." She informed him, then her eyes seemed to soften. "Oh, I see, you just wanted to talk to me."

He shrugged. "How do you know I was there for three years?"

"Well, everyone has to have three Seynorynaelian years of specialized training to qualify to come here." She laughed.

"Really?" Kiel was very quiet.

She didn't seem to hear him. She kept talking at him, but he no longer heard the words; he just nodded and mumbled whenever she seemed to require an answer.

A few minutes later, the aide led them away to their new quarters.

It was sheer heaven.

Kiel could hardly believe he'd been assigned a room of his own. Granted, it was small, barely enough space to turn around in, and when he extended the sleeping panel, it took up half of the space; the aide pointed out the communal sterilization center facility and its adjoining water closet, then allowed each of the trainees to retire for the evening. Some time later, a humanroid arrived to take Kiel's body measurements for his new uniforms.

Kiel slept little, just staring up at the ceiling in his new room, wondering how he had come to be there, afraid that he would grow to like it, then be discovered and asked to leave.

"I hope they never know," he often thought.

The next morning, a loud overhead tone awoke him; Kiel didn't understand what it meant, but he knew that the Ilas Center had used a system of tones to regimen the day. Two uniforms were hanging inside his closet panel, placed inside his room from the outside corridor, no doubt by a special access code that the humanroids had in their programming. Kiel dressed quickly and headed into the main corridor, following the others to the nearby meal center, where morning repast was served, a light, alimentary concoction with little taste, but the sherin fruit juice was divine.

"You've got to be crazy to go in for the engineers' division," one of the boys nearest him said to his friend as they sat down beside Kiel. "I hear if you're really good, you'll get sent out to Firien. What a waste—having to go out there, even if the assignment is exciting."

Kiel recognized the name as one of the faraway provinces. He listened more attentively, but chewed his food for all the world as though he didn't care about their conversation.

"What's so bad about Firien?" The other boy asked.

"You want to go to the ends of Seynorynael?" The first one laughed. "You have to be fashioned a certain way to tolerate Firien weather. Some say it's awfully lonely, wild, and bleak there, but the views are fantastic."

"You can always see plenty of views transmitted in the holo-fields, so why go? Besides, you're taking chances outside the weather-safe ring."

"Who knows why then? You wouldn't catch me going there, not even if you paid me. Anyway, I hear that most of the engineers don't last there. Elder Ornenkai has gone through divisions of them, and The Firien Project is going to be postponed until we're long gone, you can be sure."

"What's The Firien Project?" Kiel asked; the boys turned, staring at him in wonder.

"You know—Firien's where the Council is rebuilding our next explorer ship out of some crusty old ruin they found by the lake."

"Oh, yes." Kiel said, feigning knowledge. "I meant—why does Ornenkai need so many engineers?"

"They can't figure out how to build the ship, of course."

"Oh. Why is it so important?"

"Well, maybe you don't care," one of the youths said, "but Marankeil wants to expand the Federation outside the Great Cluster."

"Outside the Great Cluster?" Kiel echoed. He noticed how the other boys were staring and drew back to avoid their attention; after a while, they ignored him.

After the meal, Kiel followed the others of his training group into the hall, where Commander Misczila, head of one of the engineering divisions, spoke to them about choosing specialization; a dozen or more division commanders waited to divide the cadets into groups. Kiel paid little attention to the speech. He already knew what he wanted to do. Misczila's group of engineering candidates numbered only fifty or so; Kiel followed them, and never looked back.

"... and Captain Lier had trouble with the limitations of those early spacecraft when the Seishinna landed on Kayria...."

Kiel listened attentively to it all. Lecture and discussions dominated the first tenday of training in the engineers' division; this tactic had been devised to weed out the reluctant or misinformed trainees and give them a final opportunity to change programs.

Then, one morning, the engineering, pilot, and navigation trainees were sent in for a day of basic flight training. Kiel went along in abject terror.

"What do I do now?" he wondered. Kiel glanced about the flight center, scrutinizing the other trainees for the proper protocol getting into the simulators, and spied a boy his age watching him carefully, noting his movements. Kiel turned away quickly and vaulted in. The day passed tediously slowly; Kiel made an absolutely horrible pilot. His simulated plane kept crashing into towers before it had even taken off.

While the other trainees discussed how far they'd gotten in the test program during the mid-day break, Kiel sat moodily in his chair. He still hadn't gotten his simulated fighter to stay airborne for more than a minute. As he got up to leave, he noticed the boy he had seen that morning watching him from the far end of the room, but the boy quickly looked away. Kiel felt a vague, creeping sensation of panic.

At the end of the day, Kiel hurried back to his room from the simulation center, relieved that the test wasn't finished and he had been spared the humiliation of a public scrutiny of his failure. Yet as the candidates headed back to their quarters, Kiel knew he was mentally preparing himself for the charade to end. He began to plan what he could do when he left the center. But creator above, he thought, struck by pangs of anguish. He didn't want to leave!

Kiel knew he had no choice.

"You're not really supposed to be here, are you?" A voice called from the corridor just as Kiel entered his quarters.

Kiel turned around. It was the boy who had been watching him earlier. He had wide-set, aquamarine, almost sea green eyes and very light hair.

Kiel wavered a moment. "No." He admitted finally.

"I thought maybe you weren't." The boy said, nodding. "Anyway, let's just hope no one else noticed how bad your practice went." He laughed. "You've only got to the end of this season before they send us up for real, so we've got our work cut out for us."

"What?" Kiel asked, a crease of absolute confusion forming between his brows.

"I'm going to teach you how to fly the Valerian fighter." The boy said, then waved him outside. "Follow me. I know where the humanroid entrance is into the simulation center. If we're quiet, we won't get caught. And then no one will learn your secret."

Kiel lingered in his doorway. "They'll still know. I'm not on record at the Ilas Academy."

"Maybe not, but no one will think to check that out if you know what you're doing," the young man said.

"I don't understand." Kiel shook his head. "Why are you doing this for me?"

"Because I admire you."

"Why?"

"Well, you stood up to Misczila the first day you got here." The other boy shrugged. "I'm not saying I always agree with what you do and say, but I like it that you always defend yourself and what you believe. You're smart, and you don't put up with anything that's wrong or unfair. I like it that you've got the guts to stand up to people when they're wrong and tell it to their faces." The way the boy said this made it sound as though he wasn't capable of doing the same, much as he would have liked to. He was a natural born conciliator, or else the circumstances of his life had made him one.

"But I mean nothing to you." Kiel protested.

"People can't live if they don't help one another out now and again, right?"

"Who are you?" Kiel's eyes had an utter expression of a disbeliever forced to face the blazing power of a miracle.

"Name's Kellar. Maesan Kellar." The boy said with a self-conscious laugh.

Kiel just stared at him, uncomprehending, blinking. His expression was unsettled, his mind grasping. Kellar observed it all.

"You think you can't trust me." Kellar said quietly, "But you can." Kellar stared at him, completely serious. "I'll never betray you, Kiel. Promise." His young voice was full of feeling.

"Why?" Kiel demanded, but his voice was no more than a whisper. Kellar had to expect something in return—no one ever did anything out of their way!

"Do you always have to have a reason for everything?" Kellar laughed, then took his arm. "We'd better go now before the humanroids catch us loitering about."

Kiel stepped over the entryway and back into the corridor.

The two boys snuck into the simulation room and Kellar stood by watching Kiel, showing him which panels to activate at which moments, teaching him how to read the gauges, talking him through all the difficult maneuvers.

The Valerian fighter was immensely complicated, more than Kiel had realized. Kellar promised to help him every evening until the real flight test. If Kiel could master the fighter by then, he wouldn't have to leave the program.

Kellar watched Kiel's progress with a critical eye; it wasn't until much later that Kiel ever learned why the boy had offered to help him.

"Good, you're getting better," said Kellar one evening.

Kellar didn't know what it was that made other people so blind, but he never cared to be upset by this observation. Kellar's friends came to know that he had an innate ability to recognize the merit, talent, and the good in other people, and he was seldom wrong about them. Kellar's gut instincts had told him from the first time he heard Kiel talking that Kiel had a rare combination of character and ability that, luck willing, could lead him to a very special future.

The fact was that Kiel had potential to be great; what that potential was exactly, Kellar didn't know. Kellar didn't even know why he should see it. But he could see it. Kiel was special. He knew it instinctively.

Kellar never said anything about this to Kiel or to others, though, never even spoke a word to Kiel, not until the day that Kiel betrayed his vulnerability. Kiel had struggled his way into the center, by any means necessary, but even his talent and determination couldn't save him from the strict application of protocol.

Then Kellar knew he could hardly sit back and let Kiel fail, not if there was something he could do to help him! Because Kellar was able to see the inestimable value in Kiel, the irreplaceable worth of a strong human spirit; Kiel literally had nothing—he was poor, anyone could tell from the lack of personal decoration on his uniform, his training haphazard and unfocused, his emotions equally abstract and misdirected, his senses ever-alert, suspicious—

Kiel was tense as a cord on a musical instrument that had been severed through but for one fine-grained filament holding it together, a filament that seemed fashioned out of steel. Kiel had been wounded, and he was fierce, brave with utter disregard to his life or death, for as Kellar found out, Kiel had received little in life and had already seen his share of death.

Kellar had never met anyone with as unconquerable a spirit as this young man. He didn't care if no one else saw it; he knew how the other trainees all saw Kiel—as some kind of foolish trouble-maker, and what everyone else would think of Kiel if they knew the truth about him. They would be glad to see Fielikor Kiel dumped right back on the streets of Ariyalsynai and think he deserved it. But Kellar didn't care about what the other trainees would think. He knew what he saw.

He had never seen a man who was more of a fighter. Kiel deserved to win in the end.

Kellar's own life had been very different.

Kellar's father had grown Kellar ectogenetically; so Kellar had no mother, no siblings, and his father had seldom been around in his childhood. When he was young, Kellar had thought the world was so lonely, but he had been determined to make his own life as radiant as possible. His personality reflected his conscious decision to be optimistic and easy-going, to fight against his dour upbringing. Kellar had never before known such a person as Fielikor Kiel, someone who also fought against his past but in quite another way.

Kellar knew that he and Fielikor Kiel would get along remarkably.

And Kellar wasn't wrong about that. Over the next two seasons, the two boys spent a lot of time together; they argued over Federation issues, debated science, politics, principles, collaborated on studies and schemes, spent hours hanging about the facility and playing tricks on the girls in their training group. They were inseparable, collaborators, staunch allies, comrades in training, polar opposites in nature to the casual observer but familiar, readable, to each other. A fast loyalty developed between them, and they had the power to govern even each other's moods. No other person in all of their training years ever came to mean as much to either of them.

Before Kiel had even passed the basic flight test at the end of the season, Kiel and Kellar had become close as brothers.

And so they remained, until they died.

It happened some time later.

Kiel had lived at the Federation Science Building for two seasons by the time his secret was discovered. In the middle of mathematical training, he received a message to report to Commander Eadric Ungarn's office in the neighboring department.

All eyes had turned to Kiel, until Misczila cast a disapproving glare over the room, and the other trainees returned to their studies. Misczila dismissed Kiel for the day, and Kiel followed his human escort over to the adjacent department, listening to the click of his footsteps against the smooth, polished floor, hearing his own heart hammering away uneven with the sound of his steps.

"Oh no," he thought, dreading every step along the way.

Kiel was escorted into Commander Ungarn's office; the man eyed him with an unreadable expression on his rough, age-worn face. Kiel sat as instructed, feeling inclined to bolt, but he would have stayed in the chair until they dragged him out rather than admit defeat; he sensed that the man before him was uncompromising and critical, and even Kiel knew that Ungarn was a real veteran recently returned from space and the Ephor War.

"So, young man, would you like to begin by telling me how you got here?"

Kiel stared at him, his jaw suddenly clenched.

"I'm not in the habit of being disobeyed. You have complete permission to make a full explanation. And you will tell me, or else you can leave the center right now." Ungarn said, his eyes coldly distant.

"I came from the Ilas Center." Kiel replied, hating the deception.

"Oh?" Ungarn raised an eyebrow. "But you aren't on our record from the Ilas Academy, Cadet Kiel."

"I studied there." Kiel said, measuring Ungarn's expression. "But not officially," he admitted.

Ungarn stared at him, giving away nothing. "You passed the official entrance exam to get into this facility." He commented. "If indeed you didn't cheat your way past that. You managed to trick the testing device into giving you the exam without one of the identity authorization codes?"

Kiel bristled. "I was sitting outside and one of your aides forced me to join the others. I tried to tell him I wasn't supposed to be here, but he wouldn't listen."

Ungarn stared hard at him. Was he sizing Kiel up? Kiel shifted guiltily, wondering if the guilty expression on his face would make Ungarn think he was lying. He knew he was telling the truth, but the truth seemed so unbelievable, even to him.

"I hear you've been doing rather well in Misczila's group, so I'm willing to overlook your previous discrepancies. You understand that lies and deception are not tolerated here, don't you?"

"Yes." Kiel replied.

"Well, young Kiel, I am going to administer another test to you. If you pass, you can stay, and I won't mention your missing records to anyone. We'll put your file into our sealed computer storage, and no one will look at it again. If you fail, I'm going to send you to an ordinary public training center for youths without families, and you're on your own from there. Agreed?"

"What kind of a test?" Kiel asked.

"I want to know just how smart you are."

Kiel bristled, but his eyes never left Ungarn. Ungarn gestured to the holo-center to his right; it seemed Ungarn had already prepared the examination.

"You don't want to stay here?" Ungarn asked calmly when Kiel hesitated.

"Intelligence can't be measured accurately—only knowledge can." Kiel said, facing Ungarn squarely. For some reason, he was angry, though it didn't sound as though he was, but his anger made him extremely lucid. "We may attempt to measure it, attempt to categorize the mind, and its unknown potential, but can your simple graphs, based on a minuscule fraction of arbitrary data, can they ever hope to measure the entirety of a man's worth—"

"You have no choice." Ungarn interrupted stonily.

"Then give me your test." Kiel said.

Ungarn never told him that he had already passed it.

Chapter Three

"Where are they all going, I wonder?"

The woman known as Selerael watched another giant, silver-trimmed obsidian space transport land from the wide, arching observation window of Ariyalsynai's largest astroport.

All around her, Federation citizens of all races and ages were coming and going; the most recent advances in centipede star-gate technology meant that a trip from Seynorynael to a planet such as Ephor or Kumshicha took only tendays. And among the alien potpourri of three hundred worlds emerging from the shuttles, few took much note of her, seemingly an ordinary Seynorynaelian woman standing by the window, wearing an unrecognizable black uniform with anachronistic swirling emblems emblazoned on the epaulettes and down the sides. Her uniform was thousands of years old.

And Selerael was no ordinary Seynorynaelian woman. She was a time-traveler, a space-traveler, and a powerful immortal, grand-daughter of the race of beings known as Enorians. The Enorians had spread life across the universe billions of years before. Before they died out, they had been all-powerful.

Selerael stared out on the land outside the dome; the snows had melted at last for another year.

Another year, she thought. How many more would she live through?

I cannot die... Have I no soul? she wondered, silently tormenting herself. Why was it getting harder and harder to care about ordinary beings while her own life continued unending, tediously unending? If they suffered, wouldn't it be over soon? Yet she recoiled from this apathy; she had a mission to fulfill: to destroy Elder Marankeil, who was destined to become the Emperor of Seynornyael.

"Oh, mother..." she thought with a tinge of sadness.

Selerael stood absolutely still, still as a statue; countless citizens passed her by as she let the same thought possess her mind for an entire afternoon. Is there anything which can harm me if I fail to end the Seynorynaelian Empire? She asked herself again. She had asked herself this so many times. I could walk away and let the world continue as it is. But where would I go and would I make myself as he is, an Empress of Time??

Selerael knew she could not forget her vow. Long ago, she had sworn a vow to her mother, a woman called Alessia, a vow to protect the planet Seynorynael and to destroy the evil Marankeil, who ruled the planet, and the Federation as well.

This vow had been made when Selerael hadn't known what she was in for. Yes it had been a vow made in ignorance, long ago. Since that time, Selerael had traveled many thousands of years back in time. And she had lived many thousands more, waiting for the birth of the man destined to become the Emperor.

When Marankeil was born, she had begun to approach Marankeil many times... only to find that her arms were frozen against harming him by some higher power. Space and Time itself were preventing her from harming him. If only she had known that she, an immortal of great power, would be rendered powerless to harm him when she agreed to return in time and kill the man!

Marankeil...

Time, space, and it seemed the stars themselves were protecting him against her killing him, time and again. Selerael began to realize that she would have to be both patient and clever if she was to destroy him.

In an attempt to get closer to Marankeil many thousands of years ago, Selerael had infiltrated his life under the guise of a young woman named Elera—only to change the course of his destiny.

She had then created him, in a sense—made him the evil man he would become—on accident. For, by letting him see and come to know her, he had fallen in love with her. And her duty to destroy him had made her reject his love. That rejection had turned his heart bitter—and set him on an irretrievable course of action: his rise to power as the Elder Marankeil.

Yes, facing this, that she was in fact responsible for the fate she had attempted to alter, Selerael had tried to escape. On one day long ago, she had left Marankeil standing by a fountain in a glade of sedwi trees, and she had fled her duty.

For she had also fallen in love with him as a man, years before he used his scientific knowledge to turn himself into a mechanized robot. As a mechanized robot he had then become the Elder leader of the Council of Seynorynael, and one day leader of the Federation Council.

A cold, hard anger had burned in Selerael's heart that day, the last day she had seen him, when she stopped for but a moment to retrieve her things from the Lunei Center before leaving it forever. She had fallen in love with the man she had gone back in time to destroy—

Marankeil.

She hated the evil he would do, the evil man he would become, and yet now it was too late to know what he would have been without her interference.

Instead of destroying the empire, and the emperor, Marankeil, Selerael had assured its very existence!

Now she didn't know what her true destiny was, and she was in great doubt of all she had ever known to be true.

Selerael didn't know when or how she would be able to confront Marankeil again. Could she risk meeting him, and would he know her at once as Elera, a woman who had rejected him and should have died many thousands of years before? Did she dare draw near to him again? Selerael the powerful immortal was afraid, so very afraid that she would fail if she tried to confront and destroy him—afraid of herself more than anyone else, that she would want to love him rather than kill him.

Marankeil would understand her suffering, she thought abruptly. He had lived for more than three thousand years already...

Selerael cast aside the thought in horror. Would she, too, turn evil and set herself up as his empress?

No!

Ah, she realized sadly, it would be so easy to give up her vow.

In recent years, fighting this, she had found herself frequently thinking of the strength of her soul when she made the vow to her mother and to her own son, Adam.

I'll stop the eternal Emperor, you have my oath. No matter how, no matter what I have to do. The Seynorynaelian Empire will die with me...

That vow was all that kept her going.

Several tendays passed before Selerael suddenly decided to travel to Firien City, where the Enorian settlement had once been located. She had not been there in many thousand years. But in her moments of indecision, she found she needed to go where the Enorians had lived, where she had once lived, where the powers of good might refresh her to carry on.

One afternoon, she turned north. Memories of the ancient community of Lake Firien called S'enor-inn-ayel had begun to play in her memory. She had lived there many hundred years.

Oh, this beautiful place called Firien, she thought. It torments me with memories of things that can never be again.

Selerael wanted to run from it, but she felt herself drawn back to the ancient dwelling that bordered the lyra forest and the north shore. She walked all morning from the nearest transport stop, but just when the land where her mortal son Adam had once lived appeared through the trees ahead, she turned back to the city.

A few days later, she had gone to the provisions center in town when she glimpsed a man through the crowd, watching her carefully, his face obscured by a long hooded robe made of a rich blue material and emblazoned with an insignia she had never seen in all of her life in Ariyalsynai.

Yet she knew that garment. And its emblem.

With her telepathic power, she was acutely aware of the stranger's mind in all the milling crowds; his mind was as clear to her as a cloudless sky, but the frequency of his thoughts couldn't be heard by any mortal ears.

She took a step towards the stranger, but he drew back.

Don't leave! she thought in despair, but he was gone.

She knew who he was. He was the last Enorian. The Zariqua Enassa—an Enorian colonizer of great power.

Selerael remembered that she had a purpose, that she had a will, and he wasn't going to escape her so easily.

She followed the man back to the dwelling on the north shore which she had approached days earlier, the dwelling where her mortal son Adam had once lived.

"You!" she called out to the Enorian man, her grandfather, and stopped as she drew near.

The strange man she had followed turned around far in the distance, in the shadowed path under the arching lyra canopy.

It was indeed the same man that she had seen long ago in the Enorian Havens, when she had visited them. For the Havens were the buried remainder of the ship that had brought the Enorian people to the planet Seynorynael. She had gone there thousand of years ago and seen this man in a suspension capsule. Thinking that he was dead, she had left him alone and buried the Havens in a ton of rock.

This man was the Zariqua Enassa.

But, he was still alive!

The Zariqua Enassa sat on the fallen log in a small clearing at the edge of the forest as she came though the overgrown path and caught sight of him. His expression was still, as if he were waiting for her. "Who are you?" she demanded, but he just looked at her with a calm, level-eyed gaze.

"Do you need to ask?" He said.

She flinched. The power of his melodious voice seemed to stun her for a moment.

"I've been waiting to meet you, Selerael. Ever since that day in the Havens when you came looking for me."

Selerael started to speak, but the words died in her throat.

How had he known about her?

"I had a feeling that you would come looking for me again." He explained. As she sat beside him, she was struck by a vague understanding that he was somehow connected to this forest, that a deeper bond existed between the lyra trees and this man of Enor than she had ever suspected might exist. It was as if they were composed of the same matter, but no, she told herself. That was ridiculous!

"I'm glad you found me." He said. "I was beginning to think I wouldn't be able to meet you."

"Why?" She demanded.

He laughed, a hollow little laugh. "I fear I'm dying."

"How?"

"We Enorians are long-lived, but not immortal. You are only immortal because of an immortality serum that your mother was given."

"How do you know?"

"I have my ways," was all he would say.

"Does Nerena know that you are dying?" Selerael wondered, looking towards the dwelling. She had read his mind and discovered that Nerena was the name of his wife.

He looked hard at Selerael.

"Yes, I told my wife long ago that I thought I wouldn't live very long and that she shouldn't stay with me." He said. "But she said it didn't matter, back then. I don't know if she really believed me, or perhaps she was too young to know how she would feel about my death when the time came."

"That is sad," said Selerael. "I hope that she will be all right when the time comes."

Selerael remembered the colonizers she had known years ago, who had told her that Enorians knew the moment of their deaths.

"Can you tell me—how do you know me? You know about the time-loop, don't you?"

He nodded. "Yes, I know you're Alessia's daughter. A time-traveler from the long-distant future."

"But am I? Am I really Alessia's child?" She asked perversely. Or was she really just the creature of Space and Time, who had brought her into being just to suit their purposes?

He didn't answer. But he looked at her as though he had heard her internal thoughts.

"Where is Enor?" She asked, turning to him. "Am I not only Alessia's daughter, but also in a sense a creature from Enor? Will I ever have a chance to go back there, to leave this life behind?"

He looked at her.

"You know all of the secrets of Enor must die with me," he said. "But one day, you'll understand."

"What?"

He seemed poised to divulge something he knew he shouldn't say, but he was willing to pay whatever price to tell her.

"You and I are both creatures of Space and Time." He said. "Because we are Enorians, because we didn't rightfully belong here, in this universe. Our spaceship arrived from our dead universe into this new universe, seventeen billion years ago, and by then it was too late, for we had interfered in the balance of life here. We had joined the circle in this universe, the circle of what is and what will be—"

"I don't understand," she objected.

He sighed. "I thought you might not." He leaned back on the log.

"You love this place, don't you?" she said, as he listened to the branches in the wind.

"Firien is the most beloved place on this world to me," he replied, nodding. "Because it is here that the trees grow from the seeds I brought from the forests of Enor," he added after a moment.

"The Seynorynaelian forest—came from Enor?" Selerael said aloud, her breath catching in her throat.

"You knew that already."

"Yes, I think I did." She admitted, with a laugh.

A noise sounded at the other side of the dwelling, the song of a young woman singing. In the memories she had stolen from her mother Alessia through a mindlink, Selerael recognized that voice, though it seemed she had never heard it convey such joy. The words Nerena was singing were not all Seynorynaelian, but Selerael's grandfather listened as though he understood them, laughing slightly at their unknown secret.

"If Nerena knew what it was she was singing, I think perhaps she wouldn't sing that song. I taught her the words." He laughed. "I should go—" the Zariqua Enassa said, rising. "Alessia, my daughter, is sleeping, and I wish to go and kiss her on the forehead. I love her, and Nerena, and as I will die soon, I would like to spend all of my remaining hours with them."

"But..."

He turned back to her.

"Good-bye," Selerael whispered.

"Good-bye," he said. "And thank you."

"For what?"

"Through meeting you, my future granddaughter, I have glimpsed the daughter that I thought never to know. And so you have also given me one thing I never could obtain, something I thought one of my kind, inhuman as I am, would never find."

"What is that?"

"Peace," he replied, and then was gone.

Chapter Four

"Creator above, will someone please ask the touring transports to stop traipsing by my astrofield?" Major Lierva Kazankov thundered once she had reached the communication center inside the dome.

A great dome had been built around the ruined field where The Firien Project was under way. The Firien Project was an ongoing great project of the Council to rebuild a colossal starship from ruins found near the edge of Lake Firien, the vast ocean-like Lake far to the West of the capital, Ariyalsynai.

Lierva carried her helmet lightly in one hand and dropped it at the door. Several of the communications officers turned and nodded; some of the consulting technicians huddled in conference in the corner of the room tried hard not to chuckle.

Lierva's eyes shifted abruptly towards them; she bestowed a sharp, ice-edged glare upon them.

Young Major Kazankov had long, muscular limbs and clear, long-lashed eyes that slanted upward at the farthest edges; she had a feral look about her, and that combined with an asperity of temper had timid technicians and subordinates running for cover the moment she headed their way.

"We'll get on it right away," one of the communicators nodded eagerly.

Lierva relaxed.

"Major Kazankov," one of the subalterns piped up from his seat at the communication console.

"Yes?"

"Elder Ornenkai sent you a message from Ariyalsynai that he wants to consult with you about the change in plans. He imagines that the Council is going to have our new batch of explorers come here to Firien as soon as they're debriefed, and he wants you to prepare a report for them to look over."

"What are you talking about?" Lierva turned to the communications officer with an irritated curiosity.

"Haven't you heard?" The communications officer asked.

"Heard what?"

"The Sesylendae has returned."

Lierva paled. "Sesylendae?"

"It just docked in Ariyalsynai today."

"What, you mean—Kudenka's explorers have returned from their long exploration journey?" She said, now in a slight state of shock.

"Yes, sir." The officer nodded.

Lierva sighed, a long, deep, completely controlled sigh.

"Oh, and General Zadúmchov's coming tomorrow to check our progress. He says he's looking forward to a tour."

"Fabulous." Lierva said, kneading her forehead.

"Sir?"

"Nothing." Lierva said.

Zadúmchov—why did he insist on being a thorn in their sides? Lierva had never met the man, but rumor had it he was as irascible as they came and had yet to find a single thing about The Firien Project to his liking; the project team, including Lierva, was no exception. And every time the Grand Marshall found something not to his liking, the entire project was reorganized, technicians shuffled about, engineers fired; if the Grand Marshall made any more changes it was likely that the project wouldn't be completed in anyone present's lifetime, except perhaps Elder Ornenkai, who was an immortal robotic being.

"Blast it!" Lierva sighed, returning to her quarters.

Lierva thought Ornenkai was little help to anyone; the Elder still kept living in Ariyalsynai, involving himself in the daily activities going on at Firien only when he had a complaint to make, as far as Lierva could tell.

Ornenkai made frequent threats to come out to Firien himself to oversee The Firien Project permanently, but so far he hadn't carried it out. Between the Grand Marshall and the Elder, the project was far behind schedule; Lierva was still waiting for a team of designers to replace the ones who had quitted the post. The "Firien prototype", the future space vessel, was little more than a collection of completed hull plates arranged around an ancient spaceship skeleton, without a mastermind to fit together the puzzle pieces and two itinerant authorities who kept interfering and juggling the pieces around.

"Aaahhh!" Lierva said in exasperation as she slipped off her boots.

So, Kudenka's explorers had returned from three thousand years in space—was that an auspicious event? Would it stimulate The Firien project towards completion? Lierva could only hope. She had yet to have a project under her command fail, and she had never cared about one as much as she cared about this explorer spaceship, her latest project; why, she didn't really know.

Zadúmchov arrived early at the site of The Firien Project the next afternoon with an armed guard; Lierva stood by the descending platform in crisp white MSF—Martial Scientific Force—attire, waiting for him. Lierva was a major in the MSF.

Zadúmchov, she noticed, was noble-looking, regal, unhurried, and descended the steps with a slow, complacent stride.

Lierva scratched the neckline of her collar and shifted to her other foot. The transport had been late, very late.

Zadúmchov and his entourage headed towards her, as she was the only one waiting outside the astrofield, apart from the pilot of the air-shuttle behind her; Zadúmchov kept looking about as he approached, as though he expected someone else to appear.

"You're in charge?" He asked finally as he approached, surmising that no one else had appeared on command.

"Yes, actually," Lierva said, trying to be polite. He had no idea how difficult that was for her. "I'm in charge of all the MSF here. Major Lierva Kazankov of the Martial Scientific Force, sir." She saluted.

Zadúmchov eyed her up and down, noting her slim, athletic body.

She suppressed a sudden desire to strike him. That would certainly put an end to her career, she reminded herself. Perhaps if his glance hadn't been so condescending she might even have taken his apparent approval as a compliment.

"Well, miss Lierva," he said, heading towards the shuttle. "I hope you can explain why The Firien Project is behind schedule. The last report led me to believe that there had been more progress on resurfacing the infrastructure, but Ornenkai informs me that no one has removed the skeleton and spherical generator. The current design still doesn't meet proper spacecraft engineering codes, I take it?"

Lierva suppressed an urge to laugh. What did this Zadúmchov know about anything? All he was worried about were regulations, political policies, and conformity. Didn't he know that the spaceship wasn't being built from scratch? Didn't he know that it was never going to conform to Federation standards? That it wasn't supposed to?

"I'm sure that the starship technicians can inform you of all the details when we arrive at the site, sir." She said, with a tight little smile.

"Yes," Zadúmchov said. He sat down in the shuttle and never said anything until they reached the site.

Home at long last from outer space, the explorer Hinev, a member of Kudenka's explorers, didn't know what else to do, so he went home to Lake Firien, where he had lived before going off on Kudenka's explorer mission.

Was it to be believed? The entire planet, no—the entire Federation, was being run by a group of mechanized Elders! After Kudenka's explorer crew had given their reports to the Seynorynaelian and Federation Councils, which they now understood to be led by the mechanized robotic entity of a man once called Marankeil, Hinev decided to return to his home with a short leave he had been granted before he had to return to Ariyalsynai.

While Hinev was in outer space, Marankeil had murdered Hinev's mother, Undina. That was the way Hinev saw it, even though his rational mind told him that she was already nearly dead in her suspended animation capsule the day that he left for outer space.

Marankeil had apparently thought Undina could contaminate the living with the virus in her, the virus that had nearly killed her thousands of years ago. That was why she was put into suspended animation—Hinev was looking for a cure in outer space all the while, and hoping to return to cure his mother with the many new antibodies he had found on alien worlds.

There had been no real reason to fear that the virus afflicting Undina's body could start an epidemic—and the returning Hinev had been excited to return home, for he had at last found the cure for the disease his mother had been carrying.

But now it was too late. Undina, helpless in her stasis capsule, had been killed on Marankeil's order, and she was gone. There was nothing Hinev could do nothing to revive her. Marankeil himself had ordered her stasis capsule in the lower, inaccessible levels of the Federation Science Building to be opened to allow her to die.

But how had she died? Hinev's imagination wrenched his heart. Had she died in agony, alone, alone in the dark? Had she been aware that she was dying, that her son was lost to her? Had she thought that Hinev had abandoned her?

Undina, so young even back when she had been afflicted by the viral epidemic that cost her her life—had she been afraid? Unwilling to go? Or had she gone willingly, thinking to meet up with her dead husband Jerekkil in the unknown?

Hinev tormented himself for leaving her.

First Reneja, his true love, had been lost to him for many years, and now Undina. Undina—the thought of being able to revive her when Hinev returned from space had kept him from feeling the full weight of Reneja's loss.

"How I loved her," he thought, with a pang of memory.

He tried not to wonder what had happened to Reneja, as much as he had loved her. When he had gone on the mission, she had stayed behind on Seynorynael. Hinev didn't want to know if she had grown to love another man, if she had lived happily for so many years without him. That thought was agony to him; he had wanted her for himself, not this nameless, unknown man who had gotten to love her!

Now Hinev knew that he hated this Marankeil—for he had decided that Undina should die.

In torment, Hinev had returned to the dwelling of his youth, to the lyra forest he knew so well, now half-filled with sedwi, sherin and other trees in the gaps where the irreplaceable lyra had been harvested for wood by human hands. Hinev returned to the lyra forest where he and Undina had gathered sherin logs for a fire in the middle of a snowstorm, where Hinev and his forebears had passed the bright days of youth.

The dwelling of his family was now nothing more than an empty ruin, a slab of indestructible foundation, while the building had decayed to nothing.

Hinev's footsteps crunched over the familiar pathway as he approached the ruin; and there, sparkling with a bright, unquenchable light of silver-gold, was the small lyra where he had sat that day when his father Jerekkil the explorer returned from the stars.

Hinev sat underneath it as he had so very long ago, but this time, he lay down under it, and stared up at the sky. He had no idea what to do anymore.

The lyra was still alive. He noticed. And it had hardly grown.

It took him a moment to realize how extraordinary that was.

Then, as he thought of Undina, a burning fire entered his soul. It had begun long ago, when she got sick, before he left on his explorer mission with Kudenka. And now it was stronger than ever.

Hinev had a purpose; yes, he knew what he had to do.

He would keep Undina's memory alive—in him. And in her memorial, he would try to save lives—and keep them alive, forever.

This shall be my legacy, the Elder Ornenkai thought in satisfaction, looking at the beginnings of a spaceship built from ruins found at the edge of the water; at long last, Ornenkai was in the Firien province, and there he meant to stay.

"Such beauty. A glorious day."

Ornenkai stood at the edge of the sands by Lake Firien where the ruins of the unnamed ancient starship had been unearthed, watching the insentient androids unloading the latest shipment of raw materials for the latest construction.

"If only we knew where it had come from." He thought to himself, for no one still knew what the ruins were or how they had gotten there. Perhaps an old but grand exploration vessel, whose origins were buried in time? No one knew. Was it an alien ship, that had crash-landed to Seynorynael in early history? No one knew.

Though Marankeil had devised the new explorer mission, it had been Ornenkai's plan to rebuild the ruins of Lake Firien for the new space exploration vessel. The project had been planned and in haphazard stages of development for more then five years now, and several simple component constructions had already been created, but Ornenkai had only just arrived in Firien for the first time.

How excited he was!

Ornenkai had decided to oversee the construction himself when Marankeil's chief officer Zadúmchov left for unknown reasons.

Poor Zadúmchov, something had gone wrong with him. Zadúmchov's sudden departure had been generally denounced by the elite in Ariyalsynai, and his position had temporarily been passed to a younger cousin; Ornenkai spared not much of a moment to wonder what had happened to the Great Coordinator. He was far too irritated by the nuisance that Zadúmchov's absence was to him.

With Zadúmchov's absence, The Firien Project had been negatively affected by delays and problems.

In order to implement Ornenkai's new spaceship plan—The Firien Project—Marankeil had asked Zadúmchov many things. Zadúmchov was to coordinate a route of the galactic systems for the second explorer mission, a far more ambitious one than Kudenka's explorers' mission. Zadúmchov had not only considered star graphs and spectral and stellar observations, but had taken into account the possible effects of space travel on the mental state of the Martial Scientific Force candidates.

Now all of that data was gone with Zadúmchov.

Ornenkai in particular had been curious as to how long any explorer could continue in the empty stretches of space before experiencing adverse psychological effects. Kudenka's explorers had not been gone many years according to the clocks on their ship the Sesylendae. However, owing to the effects of time dilation, three thousand and more years had passed on Seynorynael in their absence.

This time, however, Ornenkai wanted to send a team of explorers out for longer—explorers that might not return for many thousands of years. It had been crucial for the Great Coordinator to predict an adequate number of possible inhabitable systems for each planetary stop, or at some point the new explorers might never reach the next solar system on their mission guideline.

According to the guideline, the explorer's main concern would be to link up the other parts of the universe by creating centipede star-gate tunnels—at present, it had been planned that each successive mission would follow the last further into space using these stellar gateways.

Zadúmchov had been sent to Firien to monitor the progress of the thousand crews of shipbuilders hard at work documenting the dimensions of the ancient ship from its remaining infrastructure, but after his recent visit, Zadúmchov had refused to return, and the ship had been left out on the sand while the construction of its hull began in the industrial south.

"Blast that man!" Ornenkai thought again, uncharitably.

Ornenkai had been present at the Grand Marshall's recent resignation in Ariyalsynai. He had staunchly refused to remain near Firien where his daughter, Nerena, lived. Why no one knew. They had been estranged now for many years.

What kind of idiocy! Ornenkai was glad to be rid of Zadúmchov if he let such weak and petty irritations interfere with his duty.

Perhaps Zadúmchov's absence would have been mourned had not the sudden return of the Kudenka's explorers breathed new life into the newest proposed explorer mission. But it was not the controversy surrounding the new alterations to Ornenkai's plans that concerned Ornenkai; he acknowledged that Hinev had voiced legitimate concerns concerning the new star ship's interior systems.

It was now Fynals Hinev who had all of The Martial Scientific Force talking.

Again.

Ornenkai spared a moment to reflect upon the cruel bias of history. Hinev's name, once so renowned for his "science of individualism", renowned so highly in Ornenkai's own childhood, had been buried in time. No one had given him much thought when Kudenka's explorers returned. But Hinev had been famous many thousands of years before, before he left on the explorer mission. Indeed, that was why he had been chosen for it.

Now, Hinev was becoming famous once again, for a different reason.

Ornenkai had registered what happened with detachment; Kudenka's name lived on, as he had been the leader of the explorers, but even the image of Kudenka's face was only now familiar to the population outside the scientific community, who scurried to and fro to contact these revered exploration heroes.

None of the scientists paid much attention to Hinev above the other explorers until shortly after Kudenka's explorers' return.

Hinev had then submitted something called a "First Race Thoery".

Ornenkai had expected Hinev to stir up trouble again after he read the dispatches about this theory. Yet he found himself secretly pleased by the thought that Hienv was challenging the opinion of the entire scientific community with this theory of his.

Ornenkai still remembered that when he and Marankeil were small boys, Hinev was their hero.

And how those figures who had disembarked on the astrofield recently still held him in such fascination! He knew that Hinev and Kudenka and the others had been his own childhood heroes and always would be, in a way.

It was sad that no one remembered them or cared in their modern world except beings many thousands of years old.

It was with a pang of pain that Ornenkai saw that the general excitement of his peers did not match his own. They hadn't been excited that Kudenka's explorers returned—they had considered it a strange curiosity.

The present population wasn't interested in the idea of the living anachronisms of the ancient past, but more interested in spreading rumor and spinning tales about them; the population little respected them, but they appreciated a good story.

Soon, however, Fynals Hinev forced them all to take notice of him.

With his new "First Race Theory", Fynals Hinev had made the audacious claim that all of the true humanoid races in the Great Cluster were descended from one. This wasn't what the Seynorynaelian Scientific Council or anyone in the Federation believed.

Ludicrous! The world protested.

Ornenkai heard that many Federation scientsts denied the merit of Hinev's theory. But Ornenkai secretly found himself believing it after receiving the Kudenka scientists' new reports.

If, as Hinev claimed, all humanoid life had evolved from a single race of humanoid progenitors, it would explain why so many of the races–as well as the living beings of their worlds—that had joined the Federation in the past three thousand years were so similar despite relatively recent evolutionary modifications.

It would explain the existence of the comet riders, the Enorians.

And that was who Ornenkai believed had left the strange ruined vessel at Lake Firien, though no one knew for sure. It was only a legend, a legend that once upon a time, a group of alien, celestial beings known as the Enorians, had come to the planet Seynorynael, and intermingled with the population.

"How was it possible," Ornenkai thought, "that so many humanoids existed in their galaxy? Indeed, that so many could intermarry and breed together?"

Thus far, no one had ever before presented a theory that explained both the massive convergence of the human form and the reason the intermingling of races had been possible. Mostly because it seemed coincidental that any races were similar; only Seynorynaelians among thousands of humanoid races were able to have half-race children without the use of ectogenesis and DNA chromosome alteration.

No doubt the debate was still going on, but Ornenkai had left the capital for Firien to get away from it.

Let them all talk themselves dry, he thought as he watched the other androids busy at their labor.

Hinev was always making news, and would again, no doubt.

A new thought struck Ornenkai. Hinev was a genius, and therefore, dangerous. Could he be used?

"What are you looking at, Kiel?" Kellar asked, drawing alongside his best friend on the moving strip steps of a large building; they had gone to the Ephor exhibit south of the Federation Science Building on an off-duty day. Despite the fact that Kiel had been training in Ungarn's engineering division, they still saw each other off and on.

Kiel stared at a group of children playing in the open forum before the exhibit, then shook his head.

"Nothing."

"That Ephoran armored flightsuit was incredible," Kellar whistled. "Can you imagine trying to navigate that thing in flight? You wouldn't really even need a fighter."

"I don't know." Kiel shook his head, descending the last step. "The Ephors are larger than us, so of course the merani suits are intimidating, but they're not that different from the boots our regulators use, and they're nothing to the boots of the explorer spacesuits."

"Can you imagine owning a pair of those?" Kellar laughed. "I hear that even back in Kudenka's day, it took ten years to make them and more money than it costs to renovate Ariyalsynai."

"Strange, isn't it, that we still haven't improved on the design very much."

"How do you know?" Kellar wondered, as the two headed towards the clear transport tunnel that would take them to the Framweard arboretum.

"I read about it a long time ago, I can't remember where—"

"It would be fantastic to have one of the special suits, though, wouldn't it? Imagine, you could fly to the top of a volcano just with the powered boots alone, and the temperature wouldn't affect you! Or jump right into the middle of Lake Melacre and plunge straight to the bottom without being crushed! And the one-way vision! I hear that you can see through the entire helmet, and not just the eyeguard!"

"It sounds like you chose the wrong profession, Kellar."

"Huh?"

"You should have tried to become an explorer."

"Yeah, but who knows when the next mission will be launched, if it ever will."

"I intend to ask for a post at The Firien Project."

"What? Kiel, you're crazy."

"Why?"

"Because. You could earn so much more society credit by designing the off-world shuttle starships, and save yourself a lot of grief. Maybe even get a suite in the elite towers."

"I don't want one." Kiel shrugged.

"So, Firien, is it? You know what you'll be getting yourself into, don't you? Elder Ornenkai goes through hundreds of engineers every year, and none of them have managed to get the prototype going."

"Ah, because they were posted there."

"I don't understand your point."

"They didn't want to go, Kellar. But I do."

"I can't change your mind?"

"No."

"Then, I suppose I'll have to go with you." Kellar said after a moment of ponderous thought.

"What about the elite towers?"

"Ah, forget the elite towers," Kellar said with a dismissive wave of his hand. "I grew up in one, and they're not really so special. Besides, it would be a great adventure to leave Ariyalsynai for good, wouldn't it? I've never been to Firien. You know, it might not be such a bad place. And Firien's where the real challenge is for us engineers, right?"

"Right."

"But what if we can't get the post?"

"Then there's always the elite towers, I suppose," Kellar laughed.

"Blast that man!" Ornenkai thought again. It was always Hinev who was the one to vex him.

Ornenkai had recently received the council's decision to recruit candidates for Hinev's genetic experiment.

"What is he doing?" Ornenkai could only wonder. A genetic experiment...

"Why wasn't I present during Hinev's interview?" he thought in irritation. That was only a mild sentiment, however, and it passed quickly.

"I did tell them not to disturb my work out here," Ornenkai thought to himself, looking again over at the Firien spaceship.

Ornenkai's work on the new exploration vessel kept him far from Ariyalsynai, but the truth was that he had distanced himself more than necessary. Ornenkai's mechanized unit form had not linked up to the Main Terminus memory vault in nearly a year, nor had he kept a direct communication with the Council to monitor its activities.

For reasons even he could not entirely pinpoint even to himself, Ornenkai had lost himself in his current project at Lake Firien and didn't want to have anything to do with the council.

He was sick of it all. Firien was a world away, a remote and peaceful world away.

Then the unexpected news arrived.

Fynals Hinev had created what he called a metamorphosis "serum". Ornenkai found himself in an agitated state.

Could it be true?! Fynals Hinev was in the process of creating the elixir of eternal youth!

"A serum... could it be used by the Elders?" Ornenkai wondered. By all accounts, Hinev's "serum" wasn't quite perfect yet, though; according to the report, Hinev had already devised a test serum after several years and employed it with partial success. Ornenkai knew that Marankeil would be the first to want it for himself.

The report was unbelievable, but by all accounts, Hinev had proved what he claimed!

Hinev had managed to slow down the aging process in his own body, and had developed a raw kind of telepathy. His serum had tapped unbelievable psychic abilities within the human brain and body, and his serum had induced a bio-chemical change within his body.

With his new psychic abilities and the powers of his mind expanding, Hinev seemed confident he could devise and perfect a second serum even more potent than the first; how long it would take him to perfect it, however, no one yet knew.

That, Ornenkai supposed, had created the need for human guinea pigs—hence Hinev's "genetic experiment".

Ornenkai sat, stood, marched about, tried to grasp the concept, tried to make himself believe it. He wanted to see Hinev first before his heart would let him believe. But wasn't he himself living proof that the impossible could be reached and attained?

Yes—if Marankeil believed Hinev was well on the road towards creating the serum of eternal youth, it might be true.

Ornenkai let that thought sink in.

Could this be it? His chance at human immortality? This could only be what Marankeil had foreseen was possible at long last! And did he not deserve it, after living so long as a machine?

Ornenkai wondered, though, moments after the first wave of enthusiasm died down, could he be human? He had long since forgotten desire.

Too much pleasure, such as that he could induce, was like pain. It was too easy, nothing, meaningless, just a temporary illusion of feeling.

It was only then that he realized how deeply dissatisfaction had permeated his being. His heart ached to be human once again. Suddenly he couldn't bear to live in his current state any longer.

He didn't want to die, of course, not after growing comfortable in his immortality. But now—could it be possible to have both his desires?

The genius of Hinev—unbelievable!

Recently, after the first reports of Hinev's serum were received, Marankeil had set Hinev the task of finding an experimental group upon which to test his serum as soon as it was perfected. Perhaps after the serum was perfected, then the mechanized Elders could live as humans again, but with the promise of immortality.

"To live, to breathe the fresh air, to see again, with my own human eyes!" Ornenkai had all the enthusiasm of a child at this thought.

Still, Ornenkai wavered. He had never before stopped to consider how he would feel about this possibility.

To be human or not—his mind was in torment. What could he do? Could he be human, really—did he want to face his conscience if he became human once more and subject to human laws and morals? Or would he prefer to remain a machine man with none?

He had never known until then how the past three thousand years as a machine had weighed upon him, how irreparably they had damaged his human soul.

He remembered what it was like to care, to feel, to appreciate life—but he quashed those memories.

He had become a different being. The Ornenkai of the present could not relate to humanity. His initial enthusiasm after receiving the report had begun to wane in the past few hours as he contemplated whether or not he was beyond saving, even if Hinev's serum was a success.

Ornenkai heard a noise behind him, but he had been expecting the councilor's arrival.

He's late, Ornenkai thought. Marankeil's report said he would be here by morning.

"What is it?" He hurled at the human representative Bilka, who had come from Ariyalsynai a few days before to confirm various pieces of information sent by Martial Scientific Force officers living in Firien City. If Bilka reacted to Ornenkai's hostility, he did not let it lessen his composure. Ornenkai turned to look at him; Bilka was a middle-aged Seynorynaelian, with dull eyes and a bilious temperament.

"Elder Ornenkai, Elder Marankeil requested that I present these reports to you," Representative Bilka offered Ornenkai the computer board that held the information he had gathered on activities in the Firien province.

"What is this?" Ornenkai asked after a minute and stopped glancing over the various files, suddenly intrigued by one of them.

"It's the segment I took at the northern sector Firien education center—that girl who claimed to have read the words on the ruin." Bilka explained. "Marankeil wants me to keep an eye on her, and to ask you if the translation is accurate."

A girl? Ornenkai thought. Surely he wasn't really talking about a child?

"A girl living here claimed to have read the words?" Ornenkai asked. " I thought Marankeil offered his translation," Ornenkai added, but his mechanized face could not convey his sudden discomfort. He had only received the translation of "Selesta" in yesterday's report, but hadn't gone to confirm it yet.

He had assumed that Marankeil had interpreted it!

Now, now all he could think about was testing its accuracy.

"No—but it doesn't really matter, does it?" Bilka shrugged. "No doubt the child is only playing some kind of game. Still, to be sure, Marankeil has suggested I bring her in for an assessment—to see if she is possibly a proto-telepath. In the past, they have been the ones to keep the ancient lore—Marankeil thinks maybe this girl knew the name because of something she heard. Few still live in the ancient community these days where it is said the proto-telepaths came from, but she and her mother live there, alone. Anyway, it's worth looking into." Bilka shrugged again, unconcerned either way.

A proto-telepath... the words haunted the edge of Ornenkai's memory. Ordinarily, he didn't believe in such unscientific, irrational nonsense, but—what if the proto-telepaths had really existed, here in Firien where the comet riders once crashed? Could it be that there really had been a scientific explanation for the proto-telepaths? And that, that was why Marankeil had forced the settlers of Firien to relocate, to scatter the descendants of Enor, so that none would be strong enough to oppose him.

Ornenkai decided to glance over the file—and suppressed a sudden desire to laugh hysterically.

"Did you know that—this girl is Zadúmchov's granddaughter?" Ornenkai asked calmly for all the world.

"Of course," Bilka said, shaking his head. "But you should have known all of this, Elder Ornenkai. When was the last time you loaded information from the Main Terminus?" He added with a note of accusation in his voice, as though he considered Ornenkai but an inferior adjunct to Elder Marankeil who needed to be reprimanded by a minor representative.

Ornenkai glared at him, but he laughed, a cold, sardonic laugh. Representative Bilka's desire to become the next mechanized Elder was obvious to him, even if it remained officially unspoken. Bilka's servile behavior in following Ornenkai's requests was only superseded by the man's enthusiasm in doing everything for Marakeil.

Bilka immediately adopted an obsequious posture.

"Do you require a report of my whereabouts?" Ornenkai demanded.

Bilka cringed.

"Well, I've been busy," Ornenkai added, gesturing to the new construction on the ruins lying on the sands before them.

Ornenkai looked back at the file; Bilka seemed content to watch the slow progress of the welders going on in front of them. The man stood staring at the bright sparks blinking on and off like fireflies, but the darkness was unnatural. A dome twenty units in diameter had been erected over the site, obscuring the view of Lake Firien.

A sound disturbed Bilka, and he turned to the Elder Ornenkai. Ornenkai had gripped the computer board, nearly crushing it in his powerful metallic hands.

Suddenly, he headed over to the elevation device. Bilka rushed behind him, hopping on the device before it began to descend to the makeshift museum below the observation tower. Ornenkai headed towards the largest of the fragments that had been taken from the original ruins for study. The engineers of the Martial Scientific Force had been using the analysis of the fragments' structure as a guideline for the new hull in Ariyalsynai, but Ornenkai had kept the largest fragment at Firien, hoping one day to decipher the inscription on the ancient hull plate.

"Sel-es-ta—" Ornenkai's voice faded as he began to mentally match the sounds with the characters. Marankeil knows this girl is right, the thought staggered him. That was why Marankeil sent Bilka to the Firien province to investigate.

"What is your opinion?" Bilka asked calmly.

"Yes, keep an eye on her—this girl."

"And the translation?" Bilka persisted.

"It will take me some time before I can check the accuracy for certain. Tell Marankeil I will arrange a communication with him tomorrow."

Bilka nodded, but Ornenkai sensed the representative's irritation that he would be excluded from Ornenkai's reply. Bilka withdrew for a moment, leaving Ornenkai alone with the computer board.

Ornenkai searched the files a few minutes longer for some more information on the child. He reached to her personal file. Her name—Alessia. The computer board registered little more than the basic information, but the interview Bilka had taken of the girl's claim at the training center was still on file. Ornenkai decided to watch the interchange for himself, and activated the recording.

The image that appeared in the holo-projection sphere above the computer board sent a jolt through Ornenkai.

He tried to shut off the image, but his hand, his words, were frozen. He just stared at her, listened to her lyrical voice, in profound fascination.

What was she? What was this expression of wonderment in her eyes, this unattainable shining light in her face that his darkened soul wanted to devour for his own nourishment?

The idea of drawing near her filled him with horror, horror and disgust at himself. Why?

He had never before felt so valueless, so utterly lost.

What was he? Was he this black hearted thing he had been? What would she say if she saw him for what he was?

The child was like a little angel, he thought, a messenger of Enor. She was beautiful in a way that he had never seen before, hair soft like a wild bird's, skin smooth as a flower petal.

The expression of innocence and secret knowledge in her eyes was enough to plunge his heavy soul into madness. He thought of touching her, taking some of her joy and wonder into his heart, but the thought of his cold, vice-like fingers on her skin repelled him; he repelled himself. Still, he wanted to touch her; she knew the light, only the wonder, only the enchantment of life, yes, she knew and embraced it, and it was all to her. She had seen and known things he hadn't known for all his years, things that came naturally to her, the unknown mysteries that only invited themselves into a wild, untamed heart such as hers.

He sensed she had known sorrow. Sorrow chased her, chased her mad like an animal intent upon extinguishing her joy; her eyes told him that she felt its cold chill creeping upon her, sensed its proximity, but let it creep upon her!

He felt the shadow of all the world where she was not descend upon him. He stared at her greedily, at the light where his soul wanted to go.

Where only his soul could go, because his body was already lost to him.

Ah, the torment of her visage to him! He wanted to take some of that integrity of feeling from her, not to steal it, but to fill the horrible void in him.

He wished, wished so very much, that he were human once more.

He felt disgusted with himself; he was an undying creature, and she was but a child.

She was only a child, but he wanted to drown in the comforting, all-encompassing depths of her eyes, lost to an oblivion that knew only radiant wonder, that was a part of life, surging with life.

"Elder Ornenkai, is there something amiss?" Bilka asked, waiting.

Ornenkai looked up, and said nothing. He slowly shut off the file, aware for the first time that he had no tears to shed.

Chapter Five

Nerena Zadúmchov walked alone by the water.

The warm season had ended, and the cold season was bringing a dark, rolling storm over Lake Firien and the Firien province. The wind blew in great gales over the water, exciting white-crested waves that crashed on the jagged boulders, cutting through the woman wandering up and along the rocky shore and sending up spindrift into a face bereft of tears.

Nerena stopped as she came to a small pebbled beach sealed within a cove and faced the harsh winds, her hair billowing behind her, sometimes scratching by her cheek as the wind changed direction. The last of the kiri birds had flown away south. Only the moaning wind and the endless, unstoppable crash of the waves continued.

Nerena's gaze lifted from the shoreline to the horizon where Lake Firien began unseen beyond the miles of open water. The senseless swirling, chaotic swirling reminded her of her own confusion, and sent her mind back to the same unanswered questions.

After her husband had died, Nerena had searched among his belongings for records of his origins, some clue as to where he had come from, but she had found nothing but a blue cloak softer than kiri down feathers and a few strange objects that only left her with more questions.

Why had he gone so soon? Why, why—the word held her thoughts stagnant, so much that she could think of nothing else.

Without him, she had forgotten the reason why she went on living. At first it was only the fear of death, but as time passed, she no longer cared about that. The agony of living on had grown too much for her to bear. Only Alessia had tied her to the world.

Now Alessia—the child who shared the face that still haunted her—Alessia had been taken from her by the odious representative Bilka, taken to Ariyalsynai to serve Elder Marankeil for some unknown purpose, and Nerena was powerless to change anything.

Nerena's heart swelled with deep, hollow, painful regret; her regret seemed like a corrosive that had eaten away everything vital in her body.

What memories would Alessia have of her? Memories that Nerena had neglected her to day to day, that she had often ignored her or abused her with harsh language, that she had been unable to express the love she had for her child?

Why had she done the same thing to Alessia that Nalya had done to her? she kept asking herself. She had been worse than Nalya, worse than her own mother, who openly disdained her child.

She was back to that horrid word again—why.

Every time she looked into her daughter's face, she had seen him. And she had wanted to shout, to cry out, to ask the powers that controlled her fate why he had to leave her.

She had taken her pain out on Alessia. The memory of what she had done brought a wave of self-loathing. Now it was too late, too late to tell Alessia the things she had always meant to say. Alessia would never now how much Nerena had loved her—oh how much she did! She loved her daughter, destructive though that love had been, a love that was misdirected, but with enough intensity to burn away the oceans.

But now Alessia wasn't coming back—just like her father. The council would be certain to keep her.

Had it all been a dream? A dream that began on the day she came back to Firien?

A stifled sob escaped Nerena's lips.

She had seldom ever cried before in all her life.

She wanted it all to be over.

Without thinking, she waded ankle-deep into the water, and then buried her toes in the cold, clinging sand.

And then she prayed that the powers controlling life and the fates of mortal beings would have mercy upon her. She prayed that Death would reunite her with her departed husband. Clinging to that hope, she embraced the enveloping waters, her arms spread wide but low like bird wings across the rising water. Then she swam; she took herself out into the deep, plunging into the highest waves, heading to a place far enough away that she knew she would never be able to swim back to the shore.

"Where is Hinev?" Ornenkai asked one of the guards on duty in the biology department of the Federation Science building; his voice was imperious, commanding. Could they hear the underlying impatience, the irritation? When was the last time he had been impatient, he who was immortal and owned all of time for himself?

"He should be in his laboratory," the guard answered promptly.

Ornenkai headed down the corridor.

Ornenkai had returned to Ariyalsynai to see the scientist, to make sure that Hinev's immortality serum project was in full swing. It had been nearly five years since Kudenka's explorers had returned, and ten tendays since Hinev had last visited Firien. Ornenkai had last seen Hinev on that visit, half a year after his first successful serum injection, just days before Representative Bilka finally took the child Alessia from her mother.

Ornenkai had been glad to see Bilka leave after he had spent so many tendays interfering with The Firien Project, but he had given little thought as to the fate of the young girl Bilka had taken with him. He knew that she was to become Hinev's assistant while he continued to perfect his serum. Ornenkai had worried that Hinev's was attempting to stall Marankeil with claims that the serum was imperfect in order to avoid implementing the experiment to transfer the mechanized Elder Councilors into immortal human bodies.

But he now knew that it was not so.

The first time Ornenkai had met Hinev, he had been inclined to dislike the man in favor of the unknown hero he had cherished as a child. But now Ornenkai felt differently about him.

Damn that Hinev! Ornenkai had thought after that first meeting, only half-serious.

Damn him! Ornenkai had thought, with a wave of self-reproach. Because Fynals Hinev had turned out to be an exemplary man of great character, worth, and intellect. All that he had imagined Hinev to be, and more.

Hinev was ambitious, yes, and had never before failed in anything he set out to do. He was a brilliant scientist, whose regard for the ancient lore intrigued Ornenkai. But it was his obsession with breaking the barrier to immortal life that Ornenkai was most interested in.

Hinev's last visit had lasted a tenday. Ornenkai had seen that nothing would stop Hinev from the challenge he had accepted: to create an immortality serum. Ornenkai also saw that he had made a mistake in underestimating the scientist after their initial meetings. Hinev had come several times in the last five years to help the project at Lake Firien, each time leaving Ornenkai with a growing respect for his ingenuity.

Ornenkai wanted to find a reason to dislike Hinev, but could not.

Ornenkai entered the laboratory through its retracting doors. But instead of finding Hinev, Ornenkai saw a young girl seated at a microscanner. She jumped back from her seat, regarding him with hostile suspicion.

He felt every inch of his mechanical body struggle to flee from that face, from that expression.

Ornenkai recognized the face of the child Alessia he had seen in Bilka's report.

He hadn't looked at the image since that first day. He kept her report always among his things, yet he couldn't muster the strength to look at her again; yet he knew she had been chosen to be Hinev's first test candidate, as soon as he perfected his immortality serum. He also knew that the girl herself had no idea why she had been brought to Ariyalsynai.

"I must speak with Hinev," he managed.

He was staring at her as though there was a void between them, as though the entire world was that void, and they were the only animate creatures in existence.

She moved, lightly, freely, so agile—even so young, she was a warm breathing creature with passion and fire, while he stood cold and detached, removed from her and all the living world he plunged through, an object, a bare naked soul, nothing but a shell of inhumanity keeping him in the world.

He felt very vulnerable.

He shrugged off that feeling. He was the all-powerful Ornenkai, dependent on nothing, no physical object in the world—

No, his soul revolted. He had ceased to be that Ornenkai the moment he saw her and knew that his entire existence depended on her. How? Why? How was it that she, this fragile, wild little thing, was so powerful? How was it that she could capture his soul, without so much as a trace of understanding it? She had no idea that there was any force, any feeling, any power beyond their control connecting them to each other, connecting their fates to each other's. Or did she?

She stared defiantly at him, suspicious and hateful, until he made a slight movement, and then she recoiled.

Why should she recoil? He knew the reason, knew she was justified, and he almost hated her for it. But the wounded sensitivity in her—he saw it, and his heart was moved again.

He stared at her. Could he make it known to her that she already belonged to his fate, that she had not merely wandered in and out of his life, that she was to be a participant in his destiny? And how did he know this? What power was telling him so, telling him so fiercely that he felt paralyzed by its voice?

He willed her to know that she would be a part of his life with all the passion of his being, willed her to know that she was a force to be reckoned with, a force he recognized and met as an equal, a force that he would one day deal with and be contented or destroyed. He willed her to know all of this with all the might he had once mustered as a child, hoping to direct Fate to do as he willed, trying to force upon the universe the future plans that he desired for himself.

Why was he doing and thinking this?! Ornenkai thought to wonder. His feelings for this child were irrational, and he struggled against them; he refused to accept that Fate existed and had tied their destinies together, even though he keenly felt a strange and compelling power connecting her to him.

Alessia, however, saw nothing but the shell of a mechanized Elder who had brought her from her home to this comfortless place.

He was about to say something, when Hinev appeared.

"Elder Ornenkai, forgive me for not receiving you, but I was given word you were not to arrive until tomorrow." Ornenkai heard Hinev's voice suddenly behind him, and turned around quickly to allow him to enter. Ornenkai headed towards the table in the middle of the laboratory.

"Marankeil wishes me to observe your progress first-hand." Ornenkai quickly explained. "So I have extended my visit to two tendays. Then I'm afraid I must get back to the project at Lake Firien.

"Elder Ornenkai, let me introduce my assistant—" Hinev began.

"Alessia. I know who she is." Ornenkai said. "Zadúmchov's grand-daughter, it seems."

Alessia must have sensed some of his feelings, he thought; she took a step further behind Hinev, afraid, but all-powerful. Ornenkai felt his heart wrench. The sight of him repulsed her, scared her.

You have the look of a hunter, her eyes said to him. Chase me all you want. I can't be caught.

She clearly thought of him only as some inhuman creature, a machine incapable of any natural feeling. He wanted to tell her that he wanted nothing from her, that he didn't approve of the council's decision to bring her here. He would have kept her in the rural north of Firien, where her wild heart was secure from the world, from his world.

But as much as he hated it, that would have been a lie.

Kiel glanced out the silica screen from his quarters on the twelfth floor to the courtyard below. It seemed a lifetime ago that he had been sitting there on the grass on that day when the one of the MSF found him and forced him to take the examination for entrance into training.

It was hard to believe that he had been at the Federation Science Building ever since, but now he and Kellar were going to join The Firien Project. Kiel could hardly believe that they would be working under Major Kazankov, and working with the mechanized Elder Ornenkai himself, who spent his time between Firien and Ariyalsynai.

Unfortunately, their departure for Firien had been delayed by several meetings going on in the Federation Science Building; Kiel, Kellar, and several of the other engineers heading to Firien that year had been instructed to wait until Kudenka's explorers' data had been processed fully and to take the data out to Firien and use it to the benefit of their new ship designs. Kudenka himself was supposed to be working on it.

Kudenka—the name alone sent a shiver through Kiel; Kudenka, Hinev—these were legendary figures brought back to life from time long past, figures walking around out there somewhere, he knew it, they all knew it and thought about it. Kiel wondered just how many of the cadets at the center harbored fantasies about running into the explorers, knowing there was at least the smallest statistical chance that it could happen. Everyone wanted to meet Kudenka's explorers, but so far very few people had been able to, even though Kudenka, Mindier, and Hinev had been permanently detained at the Federation Science Building. Word had it that Hinev would disappear for extended periods of time; no one yet knew exactly where it was that he went.

Kiel sat in contemplation, reading over the Firien history for the hundredth time, when a troop of MSF officers appeared across the courtyard, distracting his wayward eye. The MSF guard stepped onto the smooth white field, heading across it from their position to an adjacent building—

No, they couldn't be headed towards Kudenka's suite, could they?

He shook off the thought. There were hundreds of other suites in and around the building in their direct path. Why would they even go through the courtyard, instead of traveling inside the building, though?

He couldn't imagine what they were doing. The cold season was approaching; it was already below freezing outside.

As the guards passed into the middle of the courtyard, Kiel spotted a girl in between them walking as fast as she could just to keep up; the tiny creature was wearing thin, black-soled shoes ill-suited to the snow and simple garments, not much more than a loose shirt and pants. Why should the guards be escorting her? Kiel wondered. Did they think they needed to keep her from escaping?

His amusement at the absurdity vanished; he found himself remembering the day that the regulators of Ariyalsynai had found him and trapped him like a deloch, days when he had been dressed no better than the wild-haired girl in the courtyard. She seemed like a tiny, trapped bird, there alone on the field, so thin and pale; Kiel bristled at the sight, certain they couldn't be treating her like that if she were a cadet. It was disrespectful, even negligent of them. Who was she? He couldn't even imagine what she was doing there, but it made him angry. Yet what could he do for her in his present situation?

By the end of his training into the MSF, Kiel had come to several conclusions about the kind of man he wanted to be: he had decided that he would never forsake anyone "unimportant", that he really wanted to make an effort to give people the benefit of the doubt, if it seemed right to do so; he had realized that nature gave its gifts indiscriminately, independent of social position, and that even the most intelligent and educated in the galaxy could be hard-hearted and without a moral or social conscience.

He thought again of Jinderian, the kind, noble-hearted instructor who had lived for a worthy cause and died unsung, except by one insignificant, orphaned boy whose life he had changed forever—

"Hey, Kiel. Are you ready?" Kellar called out, stepping through the door. Kiel turned around; Kellar noticed Kiel's interest and headed over to the silica screen, then peered out. "Poor kid. I wonder what she did to end up out there."

"I don't think she's a cadet." Kiel opined.

"Maybe not, but I'll wager she's being punished for something." Kellar said.

"I don't think so. Anyway, why are you here? I thought you were going to the city today."

"That trip's been canceled." Kellar returned, turning to Kiel with a mischievous eye.

"Wait a minute—you've got news."

"I do." Kellar nodded. "Kudenka finished the reports this morning. We're scheduled on a transport to Firien tomorrow morning."

"What is it?"

"I just remembered I don't have any snow boots."

Kiel laughed.

"Honestly, you think they would have fixed the air temperature problems by now! It's getting almost as cold inside the Ariyalsynai dome as it is outside!"

"Maybe someone in the energy department is secretly trying to conserve our fuel reserves." Kiel said in jest, wearing a wry grin.

Kellar smiled. "You could be right." He paused. "Hard to believe that Ungarn's leaving." Kellar said with a sigh and paced towards the drink facilitator. He punched in the code for sherin juice, retrieved and downed a cylinder of the stuff.

"I know."

"We'll be the last group of MSF cadets to complete two levels of training at the Federation Science Building." Kellar shrugged, putting the empty juice cylinder back into the facilitator for decontamination.

"Where's Ungarn going, do you know?" Kiel asked, turning back to the courtyard.

"The Ariyalsynai Scientific Center. He's fed up with all of the politics going on here."

"What about Kudenka's explorers? Are they going to stay here?" Kiel turned back around.

"I think so. Actually, I don't know." Kellar shrugged. "The researchers have been complaining for years about the overcrowding here, since before even I got here. I guess the Scientific Committee wants to diminish the training programs and focus on research. At least, they're trying to get rid of the old officers and assign them new posts, but I heard Ungarn volunteered to leave. You know what?"

"What?"

"I think I feel sorry for the all of the cadets who'll be missing out on coming here."

"You don't like change much, do you, Kellar?"

"Change for the better, yes. But I can't see that this reorganization is good or bad. I just think I'm going to miss the way it used to be." Kellar leaned against the near wall, crossing his ankles and folding his arms across his chest.

"I've never heard you talk this way."

"No, and you probably won't again. I suppose I'm just a little nervous about leaving. I have been here forever, remember? Well, maybe not quite that long, but sometimes it seems like it."

"Here." Kiel said, pulling out a pack from his belongings clustered on his sleep panel; he tossed it to Kellar, who reacted quickly, standing fully.

"What's this?" Kellar said, catching the pack in both hands.

"And extra pair of snow boots." Kiel said, with a half-smile. "If it's snowing here already, you'll certainly need them in Firien."
Chapter Six

"Kellar, look at that!" Kiel called, pointing out the silica screen as the lead grey clouds broke beneath the shuttle.

The two of them stared, silent, as the vast crystal mirror of Lake Firien stretched wide beneath them, far away to the furthest horizon. Firien City glimmered white around a gigantic dome in the distance, flanked by a patch of brilliant green forest. Even the tallest trees seemed no more than close-cut grasses at this height, and the undulating, rugged hills not much more than tiny mounds set between the faint depressions of the silver-cut river valleys.

Their shuttle landed in Firien City, and the engineers from Ariyalsynai boarded a special transport waiting to take them to the site of The Firien Project; in ten minutes, they had reached the wide docking strip for the transport cut away into the dome. The shuttle passed through a new security checkpoint and continued into the starkly lit, gigantic dome that housed the bare skeleton of Selesta away on an artificial plain, where thousands of technicians worked in zero-g suits and on the ground on millions of assorted components; the ship itself was as bare as a sherin tree in the dead of winter, but for a painfully thin rudimentary infrastructure of the central engine core. Near the site stood the several smaller domed and cylindrical buildings of the archival center, museum, MSF barracks, and communications center.

"Creator above, there's nothing there!" Kellar cried, staring in open-mouthed wonder at the bare Firien prototype Selesta.

"Looks like we've got our work cut out for us, then, doesn't it?" Kiel laughed. The other engineers turned on the pair, offering condescending expressions at their lack of humility and reverence.

Kiel retaliated with an impish grin, and the moment the others had their backs turned, he shot Kellar a conspiratorial look; Kellar nodded understanding. Kiel stealthily turned and fiddled with the atmospheric gauge, turning up the helium content in the air; he and Kellar held their breaths, grabbed their bags and stepped away, hurrying into the inner air lock as nonchalantly as possible, suppressing laughter.

Moments later, the shuttle landed at the landing strip; Kiel and Kellar headed onto the airstrip; the other engineers appeared a moment later, and an escort led them to meet Major Kazankov in the communications tower.

Kazankov was hovering over one of the communications technicians in the communications center, lecturing him on something having to do with the authorizations codes into the center being changed without her approval, when the engineers arrived; she turned aside to greet them, bestowing a critical eye upon them, then strode towards them like a wild animal with an appropriately keen glare.

Some of the engineers stepped backward; Kellar just stared at Kazankov with an open-mouthed expression.

"So, this is the latest shipment the FSB has sent over to us." Kazankov said, seeming completely unimpressed; her eye shifted from the engineer standing in front to Kiel, who hadn't moved an inch and listened in complete detachment.

That one isn't afraid of me, Lierva thought, registering the fact with no small surprise. Yet she turned to the leader of the engineers and waited.

"Lieutenant Manafries and the Brimlad Engineering Division reporting, sir." Manafries squeaked in a voice several pitches above a comfortable level. Manafries turned three shades darker than usual; a chorus of laughter sounded round the room.

Lierva turned and glared at the communications officers; that was enough to silence the officers, and the room became quiet again, with subdued laughter occasionally interrupting the background noise of the center.

The engineers wore expressions of mortification as each began to say something and discovered that their voices were equally shrill; Kellar suppressed a smile as open laughter broke out again behind Kazankov.

Kiel's face was impassive, but his mercurial eyes flashed in amusement; Lierva turned to him, with an expression of deliberate calmness.

"And who might you be?"

"Lieutenant Kiel of the Brimlad Engineering Division." Kiel said evenly, in a normal voice.

"Well, Kiel," Lierva said, eyeing him carefully. "You don't seem to be squeaking like a rusty hinge." She observed.

"No, sir." Kiel said, his eyes flicking imperceptibly to Kellar.

"And what about you?" Lierva turned to Kellar, following Kiel's quick gaze.

"Me?" Kellar echoed in his usual voice. "Lieutenant Maesan Kellar, sir."

Lierva nodded significantly, then turned to Kiel and gave him a sharp glance before scanning the assembled division.

"I'm Major Kazankov of the Martial Scientific Force. Welcome to Firien, for what it's worth. I doubt very many of you will last the year here, but you're here and I expect you to do your best. Ornenkai will be meeting you later this afternoon, and before the end of the day there will be one meeting with the three technician chiefs Orrmyc Dennian, Celekar Calain, and Janri Miligdien. I trust this strange affliction will have passed by then." She added, reading the mortified expressions of the Brimlad Division.

"Pehrif." Lierva said sharply.

"Yes, sir?" A stout, pleasant-faced officer stepped from behind one of the communications consoles.

"Please escort our new engineering division to their quarters." Lierva said.

"Yes, sir." Pehrif nodded and headed past them. "Follow me, if you please, sirs."

The engineers turned, all but Kiel and Kellar, who lingered a moment by Kazankov as the other slowly moved out the door.

Kazankov said nothing, but before the pair turned, the barest crack of a smile turned up one side of her mouth.

Kellar had been scheduled to work on the weapons carriages during Kiel's first day off-duty at Firien, so Kiel took a shuttle by himself into Firien City.

He returned late, very late into the evening, completely sodden and chilled to the bone after a day's exploration into the cold lands outside the Firien City dome, having gone as far south as the white sands to the northern tip of the changewinds, and after all of his adventuring, he had only just begun to explore the wild province. He returned to his new quarters inside The Firien Project dome with a heart lightened by delight, utterly indifferent to the chill of his body and the weariness of his limbs.

He had never imagined that such a place existed. Was it possible that few people appreciated this untouched, bucolic, ancient land? Kiel didn't particularly care; he was glad that those who had appreciated Firien had left it untouched for him to discover, glad that those who would have destroyed it had neglected the remote province.

In the seasons that followed, Kiel came to know the land through verdant forest and sun-drenched field, across the pebbled beaches and up the wild, wandering paths through the lower hills. He scaled the lower mountains, where Valeria's light reflected prisms of color in rainbowed hue all around the wintry silence, even on the snow-covered lyra leaves, where patches of silver-gold shone through.

Kiel tramped across the glens as the snows melted and retreated, and when the warm season approached, he made his way to the north, where the stony brooks ran down from the mountains, tumbling in waterfalls down steep, rocky banks, where the wind swept up the wild sherin flowers on their branches, and lilac petals wafted and swirled in the air, cascading like snow upon the land, and where the ceiras birds sang mournfully over the bright, sandy shores of Lake Firien.

There, in the north, he plunged into the pure blue water and emerged into the warm sun in glorious delight, like a man being re-born.

During these seasons, Kiel and the other engineers had been making progress on the design of Selesta; Kiel and Kellar stayed through the year while several of the other engineers quit or got re-posted, until at last they and Manafries were the last remaining engineers of the Brimlad Division left working on The Firien Project.

Kiel and Kellar soon began working closely with one of the highly specialized technicians, Lieutenant Celekar Calain, who had been at Firien several years, and who, it turned out, appeared to be the principal driving force behind the most successful strides made on the Selesta thus far, at least as far as Kiel and Kellar could ascertain. The unassuming, rock-solid technician went by "Celekar" only and made no show of himself, but it became clear to the newest engineers as it had to the old that Celekar was a brilliant technician, with a superbly dexterous hand in operating the various spacecraft machinery; Celekar had personally constructed a large portion of the Selesta hull and most of the newly designed central crew's quarters, and had coordinated much of the weapons integration into the hull, as well as the much of the complex wiring in the completed sections thus far.

By the end of the year, with people transferring in and out of The Firien Project, a strong friendship emerged between the outcasts of Firien: Celekar, Kiel, and Kellar, and a resident bio-systems specialist and botanist from the MSF, currently the medical specialist Rikhsehr Gerryls. And if any had admitted it, these four men unofficially included Major Kazankov in their camaraderie, even though she was their commanding officer; and, by the end of the year, they would all have been content if the project never reached completion, so that they could remain at Firien together, even though each worked harder than ever to see the project to its end.

"How much further is it to the site?" The man seated behind Lierva Kazankov asked as though thinking carefully about his words; his accent and speech sounded like something out of an ancient holo-drama, even though she had grown used to the antiquated speech of Firien, and the unhurried, lyrical quality of the voices of its inhabitants.

Lierva's passenger had been wearing an ordinary-looking jet black flightsuit and helmet when she picked him up; she had a vague suspicion that he wasn't MSF, but she had been instructed to pick up the man waiting with the MSF escort in Firien City, and she asked no questions. Quite honestly, she just wanted to get back to the Firien site and record her data for the day.

"Only a few minutes," she threw over her shoulder, then shook her head.

I hate mystery details, she thought to herself, wondering why Ornenkai had asked her to take the Valerian fighter to Firien City to pick up the man in the outlandish uniform waiting just outside the astroport.

Behind her, the man chuckled to himself, finding amusement in something he did not choose to mention. Lierva shrugged and focused her attention ahead until the large site of The Firien Project appeared on the horizon. Selesta's liquid blue hull was now completely finished, and the encasing dome that had contained the construction had been dismantled.

Lierva had been in Firien since the infrastructure and inner hull construction of the "Firien Prototype" began four years ago. Firien was her fourth post, but she had only been out of training for six years. She had received a promotion to Major while working on the Gweliar moon base on Ishkur as a reward for quick-thinking in the near destruction of the adjacent moon colony by an internal systems malfunction; Lierva had returned from a brief outer-colony patrol when her own commanding officer and the other subordinates died in a sudden explosion in the command center. Lierva had returned to pandemonium in the civilian sectors within the dome.

Lieutenant Kazankov, never one to run from a challenge, had quickly organized and evacuated more than half of the resident population by the time a relief crew arrived from the neighboring base. While the Gweliar base was being rebuilt, she had been given her choice of transfer and had chosen The Firien Project, where she had initially been assigned as a coordinator between the engineer crews and the strategists and had gradually been promoted up through the ranks to one of the MSF commanders of the project.

Lierva had originally been trained in Ariyalsynai, where she had learned scouting and defense tactics as part of her specialization in strategic analysis and aeronomy, the study of physical and chemical processes in the upper atmosphere, along with various other planetary sciences related to the study of atmospheric anomalies. Pilot training had been a pre-requisite for her specialization, but she did not think of herself as a transport shuttle operator.

The man behind Lierva laughed again.

"Is something amusing?" She ventured in dissembled irritation, but the strange man chose not to respond. Several minutes later, Lierva took the fighter down by the makeshift Firien astroport, near the construction buildings where the project staff had lived and organized the construction for several years.

As soon as the technicians had taken the plane to be refueled and cleaned up, she vaulted out of the cockpit and hurried down the landing ladder, then waited beside one of the fighter craft technicians for her passenger to disembark.

High behind her, away a short distance on the field, the new explorer starship Selesta blotted out the view of the sky beyond it.

Lierva watched disinterestedly as the man stepped from the plane, clutching her flight helmet with three fingers; at least he hadn't taken his time going down the ladder, she thought. She couldn't help but wonder—why hadn't he flown in by himself? He seemed perfectly comfortable and familiar with the Valerian fighter. And why all the secrecy? This was her post, her command, and Ornenkai had left her in the dark about why she had been sent to Firien City.

The black-clad man jumped down the last few steps and turned with a wave to the technician, who promptly took over the fighter. Lierva stepped away.

"You don't need a pilot to take a ground shuttle around the site," she said, preparing to leave. Ornenkai had said nothing about entertaining the stranger.

"Actually, I intended to walk." He told her; again she noticed how odd his accent was, and she had the sense that he consciously made an effort not to speak as he was used to speaking but instead to try to speak more like her. "You're heading back to the construction command center, aren't you?"

"Yes."

"Then there's no sense in parting ways, unless you're in a hurry."

"No." She said, shrugging; they turned towards the small, bucolic community with its cluster of tall, metallic buildings and network of silver domes lying bare on the open, grassy field, without clear connecting transport tunnels.

"Well, Major Kazankov—"

"Everyone calls me Lierva."

"Lierva, then. Can you tell me where I may find Elder Ornenkai at the moment?" the stranger asked, as they passed beyond the fleet of air and ground shuttles.

"There's a meeting going on right now," she offered. "Kiel, Kellar, Janri, Celekar, and the other top engineers and technicians were assembled for a progress report with Ornenkai when I left for Firien City. They should be finishing soon."

The stranger nodded.

"Yes, I've heard all about the engine problems. Everyone's worried the project will fail, because no engine will ever be able to get Selesta off the ground."

"You know all about it, do you? Are you from the Council?" she asked.

He turned to her. "Me? Not exactly."

"You're here to work on The Firien Project though. And you're clearly not MSF."

"Oh?"

"No. Your attitude isn't MSF at all."

"Really?"

"You would have told me your name and rank as soon as I arrived."

"I suppose." He admitted, removing his flight helmet as they stepped onto the grass; a breeze was stirring on the field, setting wildflowers waving to and fro, and he seemed inclined to enjoy it.

"I hear you've done wonders managing the project teams." The stranger said, taking a deep, unconcerned breath in the open air. "Ornenkai says the technicians were complaining about hours, compensation, and the monotony of their positions, but you sorted them out. You know, before you stepped in, I was beginning to worry how the issues would ever be resolved.

"Quite a good idea, to give them each a task partner, cut their hours, and give them each a season's leave in Firien City. It'll slow down production, but we are aiming for quality. Even if Ornenkai doesn't understand the physical limitations of mortals anymore—" the clearly half-race man laughed abruptly. "I think he's seen an improvement in the construction. At least, that's the impression we're getting in Ariyalsynai."

She just stared at him. He seemed self-assured, oblivious to the shock he had given her; though his hair was darker than usual, it shone with a bright silvery glint in the afternoon sun. His dark blue, slightly almond shaped eyes were nearly violet, startling her because they were so close to the color of Seynorynaelian blood. There was a strangeness about his face; he was half-Kayrian.

"Fynals—Hinev." She said, almost stuttering it. She knew his face, knew it well. Of course! she thought. That was why he was clad in black, the black of the ancient explorers, not the same black uniform of the technician crew or the Federation regulators. But why then all this secrecy? Hinev often came to visit Ornenkai and the other engineers by himself, without an escort, and went about his own business at the site; she had passed by him once as he was investigating the technicians at work more than a year ago.

"That's what I'm here for—to keep the peace." She managed at last.

He laughed again.

"What have you heard?" she asked, noticing his expression. "Has that upstart Lieutenant Kiel been circulating stories?"

"I heard about the Zadúmchov incident, yes, some time ago, in fact." Hinev said. "I imagine few people have ever told him what they really thought of him straight to his face." Hinev said. "Or with such color."

Lierva suppressed a laugh.

"I can't say I'm glad he's not involved anymore, but at least he won't go poking his nose into our business anymore." Lierva shrugged. "Ornenkai doesn't interfere unnecessarily with the engineers' work anywhere near as much as he used to. He stepped back a bit when Kiel, Giorlian, Manafries, and Kellar got here, when he realized they knew what they were doing."

"Just a bit, though, if I know Ornenkai."

Lierva laughed.

"You've been here a long time, longer than most of the others," Hinev observed.

"Yes, I have," Lierva agreed pleasantly.

"And yet you haven't started to feel claustrophobic. Amazing." Said Hinev.

"You can tell I don't like feeling trapped, can you?" Lierva laughed.

"You don't strike me as much of a disciplinarian, either." Hinev added, with an air of indifference.

"Guilty." She agreed. "I do whatever suits me, when I'm not following orders, and if I decided to leave Firien, I'd go, even if I couldn't get a transfer. There's always a need for pilots in the regional MSF posts."

"Ah, but the Ephor War is over! And let's hope there isn't another one as long and bloody." Hinev said, sighing.

"Yes, let's hope so, but of course, there will always be another war to wage," Lierva said, feeling blithe. "There are so many in the Federation who are dissatisfied. But to answer you, I guess I'd feel more claustrophobic out here in the provinces if there weren't so much going on and so much to do. So many unending responsibilities. There just isn't time to feel trapped when you're always busy."

"True." Hinev nodded.

"You don't seem surprised by my statement."

"Tell me about Rihksehr Gerryls—do you know him?"

"Yes, of course." Said Lierva. "He's the one who's been helping the engineers devise the atmospheric and biological systems aboard the ship. Seems he and Kiel concocted the idea of putting in the lyra forest."

"So it was their idea."

"Yes. Hinev, I've read your First Race Theory."

"But you don't agree with it, I suppose."

"Well, I can't say I don't understand your motives for proving all humanoid races are of a common origin," she laughed again, "considering how it might elevate the Kayrians' social status on Seynorynael, but no, I don't disagree with your theory. I don't think your motives have anything to do with the truth of the matter itself."

"Really."

"Hey, anyone who's worked out here on this project knows there's something to the legend of the comet riders, or the coming of the Enorians some call them. And I may not believe hokey nonsense about proto-telepaths who can talk without words and move objects around at will, but I do know that there's a lot out there that I don't even pretend to understand, and your opinion is as good as anyone's—better than most, since at least you have been out exploring the galaxy."

Hinev sighed, suppressing laughter. They were approaching the entrance to Selesta, and slowed down.

Hinev turned a critical eye up to the hull.

"Celekar was supposed to have fixed the seams." Hinev said in deprecation, but there was a note of falseness to his comment, as though he had said it merely to incite a reaction; he clearly didn't care about what he was saying, but Lierva thought he did.

"He did his best." She protested, shaking her head.

"He should have done better." Hinev returned, unruffled. "He can still get to it, when he has the time."

"You want everything to be perfect, don't you?" Lierva asked.

"You don't approve?" Hinev half-turned.

"I do. It has to be as close to perfect as we can get it."

"However," Hinev noticed, "there's going to be a problem sealing up the last air lock when they bring the lyra forest on board. Such a sentimental notion."

"I think it's a good idea to bring the lyra forest on board, though." Lierva disagreed.

"Ah, but there's nothing to be gained by it." Hinev said. "The forest isn't necessary, not by any means. The atmosphere will be chemically artificially regulated in Selesta. There's no need to bring the lyra aboard, which can't even provide food for the next explorers."

Lierva took a deep breath, trying to keep calm.

"Do you have any idea how infuriating you are?" She asked.

"Me? Why?" Hinev said with a small laugh.

"Do I have to go into it?"

"No, but I won't understand you until you do."

She sighed. "Does everything have to have a use for you? Why can't it just look pretty?"

"You're mad at me for some reason?"

"I just think you're deliberately being difficult. Toying with me. Anyway, last I heard you and Kudenka thought the lyra forest was a good idea, so the explorers wouldn't go crazy on board without any real scenery to enjoy while they're floating forever in space."

"So then, what conclusions do you draw of my real motives, then?"

"I have no idea." Lierva said. "I don't often draw conclusions."

"You don't?"

"I think a person should keep their mind dynamic and alive. You know—never let 'what is' contain you—"

"I seldom do." Hinev laughed.

"And the same goes for everyone else." Lierva continued. "I figure most people don't always know what they're saying or doing."

"Well, Lierva, you may be right about that—"

"Right about what?" Kiel said, breaking from a group of passing engineers who had just come out of the museum.

"That you're late, as usual." Lierva told him with a hearty laugh.

Several minutes later, the technicians emerged from the museum. Celekar spotted Lierva talking to Kiel and a dark-headed man he didn't recognize from behind.

Celekar lingered a moment, then headed towards them as the dark-headed man dismissed himself. Celekar's eye stayed on Lierva; a frown took over the edges of his mouth, against his will.

Lierva. She was definitely under his skin.

Celekar couldn't stop staring at Lierva. He could not admit even to himself that he was in love with her.

Meanwhile, Lierva's eyes followed the strange man who was making his way to the artifact museum. Kiel said something to her, and she suddenly left, heading across the assembled construction crews to the last gaping hole in the hull of Selesta that was still being used as an entrance for the large number of technicians.

"Who was that man Lierva was talking to?" Celekar asked in bare irritation, catching up to Kiel, who had begun to move in the same direction Lierva had taken.

Kiel laughed congenially, slowing for Celekar. Celekar's only fooling himself, he thought. Everyone knows he would follow Lierva to Ishkur if she ever went back there.

"That was Fynals Hinev," Kiel said, in a nonchalant manner.

"Oh?" Celekar said, scratching his eyebrow. "I didn't recognize him from behind. What's he here for—do you know?"

"Hinev has started looking for explorer candidates for the big explorer mission." Kiel admitted, an uncomfortable look in his eyes that Celekar didn't notice.

"So why is he talking to Lierva?"

Kiel laughed. "She is in charge of all of us MSF here."

Celekar didn't seem mollified. "He didn't have to enjoy the conversation so much, though, did he?"

Kiel laughed, but his heart wasn't in it.

"What's wrong, Kiel?" Celekar asked, noting Kiel's silence.

Kiel turned to Celekar.

"Hinev's been trying to recruit me for the explorers."

"Oh," Celekar said, taking this in with equanimity. "But what about—"

"Calendra?" Kiel interrupted, thinking fondly of the woman he had come to love in the short time since he had met her in Firien City. "I don't know. I've only known her a season, I know, but I don't want to lose her. And she's not MSF, not even trained for any kind of specialization that would make her a good explorer candidate. But Hinev keeps asking, and it isn't getting any easier to tell him I don't want to be an explorer."

"Because you do." Celekar laughed gruffly. "It is an honor being asked, isn't it? You'd get to stay with Selesta, see where she's going after all this effort. Have you told Kellar?"

"No," Kiel admitted. "And I'm not going to, not until I decide for certain one way or the other."

"But I thought you weren't considering it because of Calendra."

"Calendra," Kiel sighed. "She's the one insisting that I go."

"I can't say I'd like to be in your position." Celekar said, after a moment. "So what did Hinev say to you just now?"

"Well, he said he's working on finding a solution to my problem. I can't imagine what it would be, but I'm willing to hear him out."

"It's hard to give up the opportunity, isn't it?" Celekar said, with a stony expression; Kiel read behind it and saw that the rough-faced man was commiserating. "It would almost be easier if Hinev had never asked."

"What do you mean?"

"We'll do things if we're given the opportunity, but it might be better for our peace of mind if we never got the chance to do them at all. Ah, well, stop stewing about it." He added, clapping a hand on Kiel's shoulder. "It'll be resolved soon enough, and we've got work to do."

Celekar set his jaw and turned back to gaze at the Selesta.

Chapter Seven

The suite was lovely, everything a rich Elder could ask for: brilliantly designed, excellent quality tapestries and décor, beautiful columns and balustrades... all in a rich shade of cobalt blue with silver accents here and there.

Hinev found the elder Ornenkai looking over the analysis of Selesta's last systems test in his finely adorned suite of rooms at the barracks of The Firien Project.

"Ah, Hinev," Ornenkai gestured in welcome. "Come take a look at this," he added, turning back to the computer board.

"In a while," Hinev answered, shaking his head. Ornenkai looked up from where he was seated and regarded Hinev for a moment, reading something in the scientist's eyes.

"You know about the official proclamation," Ornenkai stated the question.

"That Marankeil has suspended further discussions of the First Race Theory until more historical evidence is unearthed? Yes. But I expected as much from him." Hinev looked away at the collection of ancient artifacts around them. "He doesn't want to believe that there was a first race. The legends of the Comet Riders are nothing more than children's fantasies.... I've heard it all."

"Hinev," Ornenkai paused. "Even you have admitted that some of the genetic evidence you chose to submit is conflictory—there are enough similarities to substantiate your hypothesis, but what about the anomalies? Differences in the DNA and gene structure throws doubt on a common origin."

"You don't believe that a first race existed?" Hinev asked, watching the Elder closely, but Ornenkai chose not to respond to his question.

Ornenkai kept silent, but he knew about the existence of the Enorians, and said nothing to anyone.

"What does it matter?" Ornenkai finally said. "Marankeil's criticism of the theory has led most of the scientific community to dismiss it—"

"No, it can't help their careers to be against him," Hinev said, his voice angry. "But this isn't why I came, Ornenkai. I've come looking for explorer candidates."

"Ah."

"Marankeil sent me away just in time—some of the Federation Council still opposes the decision he supported."

"What did he tell them?" Ornenkai wondered.

"He explained again that only Seynorynaelians can go."

"Any reasons as to why there can't be any other races on board the Selesta?"

"The usual ones." Hinev replied. "Seynorynael is the only planet to have the resources and technology to envision such a grand explorer mission, and it has always been our place to explore, before the Federation existed.

"Besides which no Federation funds went into Selesta's creation. Its creation was personally funded by Seynorynaelian MSF, our Council of Elders, and other Seynorynaelian groups. Even though the Federation Council still wants to have its own representatives aboard the ship, Marankeil claims that it would be difficult to house so many groups of aliens together without conflicts.

"Moreover, the voyage we have planned for Selesta will be long-term and could last generations. Seynorynaelians are by far the longest-lived species in a space environment, and so the choice of crew is an obvious one: our own race, and none others.

"Ornenkai, what did Marankeil say to defend himself when the Federation Council first found out about the secret project—the reconstruction of Selesta?" Hinev asked.

"I don't know since I was at Firien when they found out about the plan." Ornenkai said after a moment. "But I know that Marankeil denied anything was going on here until you, Kudenka's explorers', returned."

"I still don't understand Marankeil's need for such secrecy. Why couldn't Marankeil tell the Federation Council about Selesta? They must have known something was going on out here. A lot of people knew about The Firien Project."

"I don't know why Marankeil never presented his plans to the Federation Council. They knew we were rebuilding a spaceship, but not for another explorer mission. News of this was kept hush hush for quite some time to anyone outside the MSF and its training schools, until shortly after Kudenka's explorers returned.

"At the time of your return," Ornenkai went on, "your cooperation was needed to help us with Selesta's construction, and so Marankeil had to make it official knowledge that The Firien Project was about the construction of an explorer-class space vessel."

"I noticed." Hinev laughed in part-anger. "That Marankeil waited to tell anyone about Selesta until it was too late for the Federation to join in the construction. Wonder why. What he has planned for it and why. Why only a Seynorynaelian crew—I mean what is the real reason."

"Well," Ornenkai said in partial candor, "now some of the Federation Council members are saying that there is no good excuse to excude them. Marankeil has tried to appease his opponents by stressing that we will share any gains incurred from the explorer mission with the Federation when the explorers return."

"Oh, I'm sure he will," Hinev said snidely.

"Marankeil says that if we were to now consider any Federation candidates for the explorer mission, that this would delay our exploration take-off several more years, because new candidates would not understand the technology that went into the ship and so could not be productive crew members."

"That's not necessarily true," said Hinev.

"But it is in part," countered Ornenkai. "I don't think Marankeil won the Federation Council over, though, until I mentioned some of the risks involved in such an exploration venture."

Ornenkai laughed, a stilted, mechanical sound like air moving through a grate.

"But some of the newest Federation Council members think Marankeil is controlling too much of the Federation Council," Hinev added, and Ornenkai nodded understanding. Hinev had learned that little piece of information on his own.

"They don't know the real reason why Marankeil only wants Seynorynaelian explorers," Hinev added, his voice suddenly serious.

"I know."

"Well, Marankeil wants Seynorynaelians because of the transferal he has planned."

"If such a process can work." Agreed Ornenkai. "You are correct."

"Not to deny the Federation putting some of their candidates on the mission under ordinary circumstances, but Marankeil can't very well tell anyone on the Council that my selections for the explorers are only a pretext for testing the immortality serum."

"If you feel so strongly against the transferal, then why cooperate with us?" Ornenkai asked, keeping his voice steady.

"Because if I have my way, the transferal will never take place, Ornenkai—the candidates I select will become the next explorers as promised. Once I have determined all of my immortality serum's side effects, I can begin to create immortal clones for you, your memories and minds, as it were."

"He will order you to make transferals if it can be done."

"I won't do it," said Hinev. "Marankeil will have to get his other scientific specialists to do that part for him. For my part, I am only recruiting explorer candidates for serum testing, so that they can survive the long space journey."

"Hinev, Marankeil plans to give the Federation what it wants when we have succeeded in the transferal of our minds into the explorers' immortal bodies."

"I won't do that for you, as I said." Hinev shook his head. "You will have to get your other scientists to make the transferals."

"It will be done, Hinev." Ornenkai said, suppressing an image of the grisly reality of what his words entailed—stealing another human being's body, his flesh, killing his memories and implanting his brain with another's memories and soul. Stealing the body and destroying the mind of another being—it sounded so cold, so clinical. The actual thought of it mortified Ornenkai.

Yet Ornenkai tried to keep himself detached. Wasn't this what he had always wanted? Wouldn't he do anything to have what he wanted?

"Marankeil plans to tell the Federation that your explorers were killed in a training maneuver, or were dismissed as inadequate—anything he can think of to explain what happened to them." Ornenkai continued. "And the Federation won't question that Marankeil has a new body form—if he tells them that it is merely a clone embodiment."

"Will they believe him?"

"His mechanized unit will interface with the clone, and give its approval."

"What I will not do, I cannot stop, I think—but I will try to stop you," said Hinev quietly.

Ornenkai shrugged. "You will be the one who is stopped, Hinev. Once you have fulfilled your useful purpose to us."

Ornenkai suppressed a sudden sad, fearful feeling. Why he didn't know, but he kept thinking of Alessia. He thought of her often.

"Tell me, no matter what, you won't use Alessia as a subject to test the transfer?" Ornenkai asked.

Hinev regarded the mechanized Elder. His face and posture revealed nothing. Hinev had known him for many years, and during that time, an odd kind of friendship or cooperation had grown between them, despite Hinev's unabashed hatred for the mechanized Elders in general. But Hinev had not failed to recognize that a spark of humanity lived yet in the heart of Ornenkai.

Hinev laughed, a hollow laugh. "No, I'm going to send Alessia away to join the Martial Scientific Force. I would never allow her to embody one of your Elders' minds, either." He said, his words acerbic. "But tell me, why do you ask?"

"Elder Neliciya has asked for her body." Ornenkai said quickly, clinically. "She has already asked Marankeil for her... her body if the serum experiment is successful, if the first attempted clone transfer you perform is successful."

Hinev stared, steel-eyed, at Ornenkai. I pity you, Ornenkai, he thought. But his words portrayed a different emotion.

"You have more influence with Marankeil than anyone."

"Perhaps," Ornenkai's voice fell, "but I want your assurance that you at least won't allow it."

"How can you even ask that?" Hinev laughed at the absurdity. "I would give up my freedom before I let Marankeil harm a single hair on her head. Alessia—is like the child I never had." As he spoke, Hinev regarded Ornenkai. The Elder sighed, a sigh of relief.

This time, Hinev laughed hard. Ornenkai cast him a questioning gaze.

"You surprise me, Ornenkai," Hinev said after a moment. "I thought your only concern was for your own life."

Ornenkai said nothing for a while.

"You really love her as a daughter?"

"Yes," Hinev said, not understanding Ornenkai's train of thought.

"Then I am indebted to you."

"Indebted to me?"

"Because you love and respect Alessia so absolutely, Hinev, she loves and reveres you with the same kind of devotion. That's not an easy thing to accomplish."

"Any child can learn to love its father or mother." Hinev said, shaking his head. "Most children can learn to love, regardless of situation."

"I don't know." Ornenkai returned.

"You don't know? You mean you don't agree."

Ornenkai shook his head. He had no reason to say more, but more was in his heart, from his own childhood, and that of his once best friend, Marankeil.

"No, I don't agree," said Ornenkai. "I think we can only develop the capacity to love and to respect others if we can first learn to love and respect our parents, and for that love to be possible, our parents must also respect us, and not merely love us. You see, a child cannot love the person who does not value and respect him and only loves him blindly."

Hinev's brows drew together a moment; Ornenkai didn't know how to measure the expression on his face.

What was Hinev thinking of—of his own mother and father? It struck Ornenkai that he knew very little about Hinev's background; Hinev was a man young by universal time, even though he had come from another age and had been gone so long. Perhaps the days of his youth, their shared era of youth, seemed not so very long ago to the half-race man.

"You may have a point." Hinev said at last.

"Believe me or not, as you choose," Ornenkai continued. "But when either that parental love or that parental respect is missing, the child will grow to a man with a gross deficiency, like a black hole at the core of his soul, which no ray of light can penetrate. No matter how much adulation and respect he earns in his life, nothing can stir the black void within him."

Hinev looked askance at the Elder; Ornenkai realized that he had said something amiss and shrugged it off.

Hinev knew all at once that Ornenkai was speaking of the Elder, Marankeil.

"You know, Hinev, if we don't get the main engine prototype working, we can forget the explorer mission altogether."

"I am aware of the problem." Hinev laughed.

"So are you going to tell me about it?" Kiel said, sitting beside Lierva at the dining table in The Firien Project cantina more than a season after Hinev's arrival.

"About what?"

"About what's bothering you?"

"What kind of a question is that? Kiel, you know what's bothering me."

"Leaving Firien behind?"

"Yes." She said softly.

"You've decided then?" Kiel asked; Lierva turned, bestowing a glare on him.

"Yes." She didn't elaborate. "So tell me, Kiel, what changed your mind about it? Was it Kellar? Did you tell Hinev you'd join the explorer candidates because Kellar wanted to go?"

"Partly," Kiel admitted, his heart heavy. Was it fair to have to choose between the closest friend of his life, a man who had become his own brother, his own family, and the woman he loved so completely?

"And partly because Hinev made me a vow to put Calendra in suspended animation," Keil added, still uncertain how he was going to feel when the time came for Calendra to go into suspended animation; meanwhile, she was to remain in Firien City while the explorer candidates trained in the capital.

Lierva turned to Kiel with a look of horror in her eyes.

"Kiel, you didn't ask her to do that—"

"She insisted on undergoing it herself." Kiel said, in a flat tone.

"You should have stopped her."

"It was her decision." Kiel said, masking his pain, masking his fear—and his own sense of guilt. He also felt greatly indebted to Calendra; she had made his choice for him, so that he might never really know what he would have done without her interference. He was glad not to know what he would have done. "And—she made it without me. She went to Hinev and secured his promise that he would do this for her."

"What are you saying?"

"I had casually told her that Hinev was keeping several suspended animation chambers, and then the next thing I knew, Hinev had already heard from her that we had both agreed to her having one." As he spoke, he felt annoyed at Hinev; Hinev had said his last but most essential consideration in choosing his explorer candidates was to find people who were willing to do selfless things for each other, and so many of his choices were made among friends and groups of close relations. Who knew better the value of sacrifice than Calendra? Why wasn't she allowed to become an explorer?

"Why would she do that, even for you? It's dangerous, and the people who are revived sometimes don't live for very long afterwards." Lierva breathed, surprised, while Kiel sat in thought. And why hadn't Hinev told her, Lierva, about it? she wondered, wounded that he had kept yet another secret from her. How many secrets were hidden beneath those eyes of his? The longer she knew him, the more she was convinced that he kept himself and his motives from her, and everyone else.

"I don't know." Kiel shook his head. "I've never met anyone who was willing to sacrifice so much just because she loved someone. I think—I think I don't deserve her."

"Kiel, don't talk like that." Lierva said, irritated. "You didn't pressure Calendra to do anything for you, if I know you."

"I know, I know. I'll just have to try to make her proud of me, won't I?"

"I'll just make sure you do."

"You're going to Ariyalsynai then?" Kiel asked, but he didn't sound at all surprised. He knew that Lierva was desperately in love with Hinev, even though she took pains not to let anyone know about her recent secret relationship with the half-race man, not even her closest friends, not because she was ashamed, but because she had no intention of letting anyone know about her personal life, and partially because Hinev wanted their relation to remain private.

Kiel could see that Lierva was besotted. Hinev was still at Firien, and the two of them spent a considerable amount of time in each other's company, which Kiel noticed from the times he had run across them. They held hands but drew apart abruptly when intruded upon; they also went off on excursions together, but kept respectful distance when conversing with each other in anyone else's company.

But was Hinev in love with Lierva? Kiel didn't know; Hinev and Lierva seemed to enjoy each other's company quite a lot of late, but Hinev never admitted anything openly about their relationship. If he loved Lierva, why would he want her to become an explorer and leave him behind forever when she went off into space? And why would Lierva agree to do this, even if it meant she could be transferred near Hinev for a short while longer? She had to know that Hinev was expected to return to Ariyalsynai after another couple of seasons, but no one knew when exactly he would be calling in his explorer candidates, or if he would change his mind about inviting them into explorer training. Was that why Lierva had decided so quickly, as though that would ensure that Hinev never forgot her?

"Yes, I'm going—going to be an explorer, if all goes as planned." Lierva said at last. "But you knew that."

"Yes, I figured you would." Kiel shrugged.

"Kiel, what do you suppose Hinev meant when he said we'd have to undergo some special 'genetic experiments'?"

"If you don't know that, how should I?" he teased. She sighed in exasperation.

"I'm going to ignore that." She informed him. "The reason I asked is—have you ever heard that Kudenka's explorers had to undergo genetic experiments before their mission?"

"No," Kiel admitted, in a manner that suggested he had been contemplating the same thing.

"So?"

"I don't know." Kiel shook his head. "But Hinev said it's the only way to survive the mission."

"Is that what he told you?" Lierva said.

"Yes. What did he tell you?"

"Nothing," she said, shrugging. "Except—except that when we do get to Ariyalsynai, we're to be separated into solitary confinement for serum injections."

"Yes, he told me that, too."

"And that doesn't bother you?"

"A little, but I imagine we'll have to be monitored, and he doesn't want any outside contagions to interfere with the experiments."

"I don't know about that." Lierva said. "I still think it's odd."

"It is." Kiel agreed.

"Any luck with the engines?" Lierva abruptly changed the subject; Kiel frowned. "Sorry I asked," Lierva laughed. "Well, it might not matter if we ever go into training, if the spaceship Selesta can't get off the ground."

"I don't want to think about it." Kiel said.

"You don't want to think about it?" Lierva laughed at the absurdity of the entire situation, at the frustration she knew they were all feeling, everyone who knew about the engine problems; Selesta was nearly finished, all but the engine, and the last several test firings had failed. "What about me? I've put in more years here than any of you."

"Oh, what about Celekar?" Kiel asked; Lierva's eyes took on an unsettled expression, as though a dark cloud had fallen over her. "He's been here as long as you."

"I know. Celekar's just as upset as you are about the engine failures."

Kiel tried hard not to say anything in response, thinking that a lot of Celekar's animosity had more to do with Hinev's relationship with Lierva. Celekar was secretly in love with Lierva.

"Hinev might change his mind—about Calendra." Lierva said suddenly.

"He told you that?" Kiel turned to her with a hopeful expression.

"No, but I know he said he's going to wait to see how the training goes before recruiting more explorer candidates. You could help Calendra, once you've gone through the training, and then—then maybe she'll be able to pass it." Lierva said; Kiel sensed Lierva was thinking about Calendra's physical condition. Calendra wasn't very strong physically, and wasn't likely to pass any kind of physical fitness examination that the explorers might have to undergo.

"That's the best idea I've heard all day." Kiel said, brightening.
Chapter Eight

Just who was this Alessia Valeria Zadúmchov Enassa? Why did she seem so familiar to him? Was it a gesture? Or was it in her eyes? Marankeil didn't know. Yet there was something about her that had vexed and annoyed him since the moment he had laid eyes on her.

Her eyes reminded him of someone else's, though he couldn't at that moment place whose.

The young Alessia, now a young lady, was stubborn, free-spirited, and utterly independent; she was also beautiful, but he no longer cared a thing for outward beauty.

Who ever would have suspected that Zadúmchov's granddaughter would be an empath, perhaps even a proto-telepath? Zadúmchov had been loyal to the end, but his granddaughter was a creature who didn't understand duty yet, who would have to be tamed and forced to learn what duty meant.

She would have to be tamed, or controlled, by any means necessary.

Hinev had been teaching Alessia for years now, but Hinev had also been keeping the truth about her parentage secret, Marankeil was certain; Hinev didn't know that Marankeil already knew it, and that was why he had suggested her to be Hinev's assistant in the first place. Alessia was clearly part-Enorian, more so than anyone Marankeil or Hinev had ever seen. Even as a child, her power, her potential telepathic abilities had been clear, but that wasn't the reason Marankeil harbored suspicions about her parentage.

No one could have translated the fragment from the original Selesta, and yet she, a mere child, had been able to do it—yes, as though the translation had been but child's play.

No one could have made the translation who had not been taught to read the symbols, Marankeil knew, knew this in his soul. After all the years that he and Ornenkai had studied the syllabaries of the comet riders, the Enorians, after all of the years of study made by the lore-masters, no one had been able to decipher those syllables, and yet, after Alessia had made the translation, it seemed such a simple discovery, such an easy step to take.

Alessia had been taught by someone, someone who must have been from Enor.

Marankeil had already confiscated the rest of the writings that could be translated now that Alessia had deciphered the characters on the fragment; unfortunately, the characters still hadn't been enough to unlock all of the secrets of the ancient writings.

That was why Marankeil had arranged for the Firien doctors to place a controlling nano-chip in Alessia's brain before she was even taken to Hinev.

And in his secret meetings with her, secret because she never remembered them, Marankeil had gradually drawn out her secrets, forced her to tell him all she knew of the comet riders, the Enorians, all she knew of her father.

Could it be that her father hadn't been part-Enorian, but an Enorian himself? Could it be that she, Alessia, was more powerful than anyone realized?

No; Marankeil rejected the thought. No, it couldn't be! For, hadn't her father died? And the Enorians were immortal, he was sure—though he didn't know for absolutely certain. Yet hadn't the ancient writings recorded that there were immortal beings who had come from the stars—creatures they called the Enorians? For long ago Marankeil and Ornenkai had found Enorian legends written in the ancient archives building—including a legend of an immortal woman who would destroy any leader to rise to greatness.

A leader Marankeil was sure would be him.

Perhaps he was paranoid, but Marankeil knew, knew it would be him.

Then, excellent news had arrived from Fynals Hinev.

Hinev had at last been successful in his serum experiment! He had achieved the creation of the immortality serum and tested it upon his assistant, Alessia. Her subsequent metamorphosis into an immortal being, an undying creature, had been a miracle no one had thought possible—except Hinev, who had known for many years that the Enorian blood DNA and DNA in the lyra tree held the key to immortality.

The Enorians had died, but they had not had to. They had died, but hadn't died for many thousands of years as living men. Hinev had distilled the long-lived genetic strains and found the secret to immortality. He had contained it in his serum, which when injected into Alessia, had rendered her blood a catalyst for a metamorphosis within her body. Through her blood, his serum had permeated every cell, and altered her genetic structure.

Marankeil received the news that Alessia didn't die when attacked with a cyber-pistol, that her body re-healed itself like the lyra tree, and that she was immune to sharp blades, and every manner of injury, in a sense, for her body, once punctured, quickly re-healed itself. Blood testing showed that her aging process had halted entirely. That her body was, in fact, no longer changing by normal cellular mitosis or meiosis.

Marankeil knew suddenly that he had more to fear of Alessia than he had initially thought. And, immediately he was glad that she would always be firmly under his control.

How had Hinev done it? Everyone knew that he had been trying longevity experiments since before the Kudenka explorer mission, in order to save his mother Undina, who had been afflicted by a rare virus, years ago in the distant past.

But to have achieved immortality—it was unbelievable.

Marankeil felt a wave of hatred for the girl, Alessia, the first immortal human—for she now had what he had always wanted, immortality in a human body, had what he had always wanted without even trying for it, and he was the one who had allowed it to happen. He was the one who had allowed—even funded—Hinev's experiments, and allowed her to become a threat to him. Did he have a choice but to forcefully control her actions and destiny? The nano-implant he had had inserted into her brain would forever ensure that she would be his pawn.

He wasn't going to let her destroy him, Enorian legend or not. Let her try; she never knew he controlled her, that he could control her, because he forced her to forget all of her memories of their meetings; he was careful never to warn her of the futility of her resistance to him without removing her recollection of it.

Yes, Marankeil was satisfied that he could control her; he was also satisfied that soon, Hinev would be able to transfer his mind and soul's memories into the body of the brilliant Firien engineer Fielikor Kiel and Ornenkai into the body of Maesan Kellar or one of the others, as Ornenkai chose, and that then, he wouldn't have to fear Alessia at all.

But for now, Marankeil hated Alessia's stubborn resistance, her defiance of him in their secret meetings, even though she was clearly defeated, defeated before she even attempted to fulfill her destiny. He wanted her to know it. He had won; by using the nano-implant, he had thwarted the Enorian legend.

After some time, Marankeil realized why he despised Alessia so much; her gestures, her attitude, reminded him of another, another perhaps older and wiser than Alessia, another woman who had been every bit as brilliantly defiant and resistant to him: Elera Erlenkov.

Why was he thinking about Elera now after so many years? Marankeil wondered, and he kept wondering this every time Lieutenant Alessia Enassa left the Main Terminus to return to Ungarn's division. Elera Erlenkov was dead, long dead, he told himself.

The woman he had loved. The only woman he had loved.

It was undeniable and vexed him that Elera was just as alive and vital in his memory as she had ever been; he would have given his soul to exorcise her from his memory—or would he? The moment he thought so, he took this statement back.

He quashed the memories which meant nothing to him; had he rid himself of that body, his original living body, that had known her? And had that not purged his soul of her? What did he need of anyone, now that he had power over all of Seynorynael, now that he was the revered Elder Marankeil?

And why was it that he kept summoning Alessia to him, to these secret meetings, to force her willful pride into submission?

What amazed him was that there was nothing unattainable for him in all the universe, at least, nothing tangible. He felt he could never have enough power, though he knew no one wielded as much power as he did, and with that power he could so easily have anything he wanted—anything except to have back the past.
Chapter Nine

Kiel would never forget how it all happened.

While Kiel headed to the Federation Science Building Wing where Hinev's serum experiment would take place, Kiel remembered the morning he had arrived in the Federation Science Building as a youth. The walls and corridors were thick with memories of former days spent there, friends he hadn't thought of in years, memories of times that had seemed so difficult, so trying, yet now brought only humor and amusement, and bittersweet nostalgia.

Hinev waited in the private wing where the serum experiments were to take place; Kiel was escorted to the facility by several MSF who talked about the recent outbreak of war on planet Pydifeon and asked him questions about the weather in Firien. Kiel was to be the first of the explorer candidates to receive the serum; Lierva, Gerryls, Kellar, and Celekar had yet to arrive from Firien, and the other candidates were scheduled for the upcoming few tendays.

Kiel talked with Hinev about the particulars of the procedure scheduled for the next day, about how much serum he was to receive, about how long it would likely take for him to recuperate from the serum transfusion. And Hinev had tried to prepare him for the pain, the pain Kiel's rational mind accepted as part of the process, before Kiel left for his temporary quarters to get some sleep.

That was the last night of natural sleep Fielikor Kiel ever knew in his life, the last time he would ever be able to dream as an ordinary man, and to know himself and himself only, to be the Fielikor Kiel he had known his entire life long.

The next morning, Kiel arrived in Hinev's new laboratory and allowed himself to be prepared for the serum transfusion; Hinev used a minor narcotic injection to put Kiel to sleep; as Kiel drifted off, he wondered briefly why Hinev was strapping him into the sleeping panel.

Hinev hadn't prepared Kiel enough for the pain.

Kiel was asleep, peaceful, when suddenly a sensation he had never known hit him.

Electric shock, burning fire crawling through his veins, leeching into every last microunit of his body, a chill like death, a creeping cold, a sensation of suffocation in his every organ, pangs of nausea, stabs of fear, waves of panic, acid stinging, massive crushing, tissues throbbing in agony, the sound of screaming, his very cells screaming in agony as they died, suffocated by light and fire more dangerous than Valeria's light, his cells freezing into oblivion, and whispers, the whispering of his cells, his new cells, as they listened to his memories, and knew him utterly—he experienced all of these things...

The pain of it had seemed unending, eternally unending, for he remembered nothing at all, saw nothing at all, but the vision of an other-worldly city with beautiful white towers, a place he felt he had seen before, even though somewhere dim he knew this body of his had never been there.

The screaming went on, and finally he heard himself screaming. He heard heartbeats, slow, thumping heartbeats that seemed everything, and he couldn't escape them; the roar of voices in his ears dulled until he heard only one, a soft singing voice...

Just before he woke up, he thought he saw a memory entering his blood, a memory he had never known, looking down on a someone from above—yes, he was sitting on someone's shoulders, a person with silver hair that reflected light in prisms of radiant color—

Who was this person? he wondered. Who owned these memories, these invading memories, that belonged not to him but to the cells that had become a part of him, fused with his own blood, with his body, these cells that had spread the burning fire through him, changed him, awakened him, made him feel the pain—

The pain that was over now. He felt nothing but a light bliss in that dream state just before he woke up. Yet who rightfully owned these living blood cells that were now a permanent part of him? He demanded to know, demanded to know where the visions had come from, and why they tore at his heart, why they refused to declare their rightful identity to him, even though they remained within his body, eternally alive but eternally separate from him.

Hinev was there when he awoke; the man's eyes were haunted in a way they had not been the morning Hinev instructed him to lie on the sleeping panel.

Yet how long ago had that been?

Kiel woke with a sense of discernment, keen-eyed, alert.

Why was it that he was so fully aware of every sensation in his body, every cell of his body, and where he was, how he was interacting with the molecules in the world around him—or rather, how he chose no longer to react to them, but instead felt himself in cooperation with them—perhaps even able to manipulate them by will if he tried—

That was when he saw Hinev standing beside the sleep panel.

Why is he looking at me like that? Kiel wondered.

"Because I'm glad to see you." Hinev said, laughing.

Glad to see me? Kiel thought, easily moving himself into a sitting position, breaking the indestructible organic bands about his chest as though they were weak elastic.

Kiel blinked in surprise, staring down at the sundered bindings.

"Yes, glad to see you." Hinev said, catching Kiel's attention again. "Glad to see you finally awake again."

"Hinev," Kiel said quietly, directing a level gaze into his violet eyes. "What happened to me?"

"I think you know." Hinev said quietly.

"Kellar, Lierva—" Kiel said, in a panic.

"They're all right." Hinev reassured him. "You'll see them soon."

Kiel felt his thoughts overwhelmed by concern for them, his friends, who had committed themselves to the same kind of torment this horrible experiment had forced upon him—

And then felt them nearby. How, how could he feel their presence? he wondered. Why was it that he could sense them, as though he were seeing them far away?

He pulled back into himself suddenly. No, this wasn't possible! he told himself.

And then he heard Kellar.

I'm all right, Kiel, I just wish I had been able to talk with you like this when we had that awful Federation economics exam—

Will you stop running at the mouth, Kellar! Lierva interrupted. If I have to hear one more word about your bloody fantasies, I'm going to scream—

Lierva, I didn't say anything to you, and you didn't hear anything, but if you'd like to scream—

What? Lierva thought. I thought that was you going on about nonsense—

Maybe, I can't tell who's thinking at me. I keep hearing noise in the air, coming from everywhere, do you?

No. I woke up three days ago, and I'm still trying to figure out why things keep moving around in here—

Every time your temper flares? Kellar finished, with a mental laugh.

How did you know?

I've been listening to you since you woke up. I've been all over the Federation Science Building since I woke up, but Hinev hasn't taught me how to turn off this thinking antenna I've suddenly got or how to channel it and tune into anything. I have to say, though, Lierva, you've got some pretty interesting dreams—

Stay out of my head! she warned.

And I was just starting to like it there.

Why, Kellar, Lierva thought, in surprise. I never knew you thought that way about me—

What? I didn't! I mean I don't! What did you hear me thinking?!

Whoever is polluting my brain with perverted thoughts better stop it right now, a woman's voice interrupted.

Who else is out there, listening in on our conversation? Kellar demanded.

It's me again, Broah, and I'm getting tired of waiting around in here, playing games with a telekinetic trainer. Hinev—are you coming back? Hinev—do you hear me?

I'm thinking I just can't stand waiting around. A male voice interrupted. I've been awake a tenday, and I still haven't worked up an appetite. Hinev hasn't brought any food in for me, and my sister keeps talking to me about keln flowers, as though it's the most fascinating subject in the world! I think she wandered over into the botany department, mentally speaking.

I heard that, Onracey!

I rather think she's got good taste, Gerryls added. I've always felt plants are an interesting subject—thank you, Wen-eil, for that interesting side-note—

Would someone please stop playing that infernal tune over and over in their heads? Another male voice asked.

Sorry, someone said.

Is that you, In-nekel?

No, it's me, Derstan.

Hey, do you really think I'd look better with my hair parted down the side, Loussya?

Mindra, pick a number between one and a hundred.

You two aren't still playing that stupid number-game, are you?

Would everyone just please be quiet? I'm trying to get some sleep! And I've been trying for nearly a tenday—

You really think you're better than me? Well, then, we'll just have to set up a trivia game sometime and see who wins—

Hey, I don't have big, ugly feet!

Didn't Hinev tell us to keep our thoughts to ourselves? someone asked.

Well, it's not like we can control them yet, is it? Celekar interjected, for the first time.

Jir-end, will you please stop laughing? I haven't gotten to the punchline yet—

So, that's what you really thought about me? I thought you hated my guts—

Kellar, I never knew you were so intelligent. Gerryls laughed.

He's just really good at covering that up, Lierva laughed with him. But now we know his dirty little secret, so he'll have to stop playing dumb.

Hey, has anyone gone over to the economics department? If you invest your Federation work compensation in Iolar berries this year, you'll be able to buy a white tower of your own!

Ioka, you won't believe it, but I just found Kudenka in the other building!

Did you read his mind?

I wish I could, but right now all he's thinking about is his data, and I can't dig deeper to anything interesting!

Broah, aren't you supposed to be paying attention to your telekinetic trainer? Hinev's voice interrupted, and the voices halted temporarily.

Then a few of the voices came back, talking about more serious things, comparing mental power strengths and weaknesses.

Has anyone managed to get the silica rods to stay suspended?

No, but I'm getting really good at rearranging them when they break!

Hey, Sar-a, I bet you wished you could re-structure that cordan heirloom we had when we were kids before you broke it—

Kiel, can you hear me? Kellar asked, talking over a backdrop of other thoughts.

Yes.

I was beginning to worry about you. Kellar admitted. What? Who was that telling me I talk too much?

Is it just me, or does it seem as though I'm hearing twenty conversations at once? a female voice asked.

Twenty-odd different mental voices responded with a resounding no so loudly that Kiel winced. Then he stopped, thinking—why hadn't the mental echo wounded him?

Wait a minute—there was no pain, nothing, no pain at all. His body felt nothing like pain, only pleasure if he asked for it—

and no sense of cold, heat, hunger...

He began to panic. Could he summon sensations?

Yes, actually, you can. I've managed to give myself a right shiver if I open the window and concentrate long enough, a male voice told him casually.

Who are you? Kiel wondered.

Talden. Talden Faehey.

Kiel stepped to the ground; only a few seconds had passed since he woke up, and his head already seemed to be spinning, even though it wasn't.

"Take it easy." Hinev said.

"Nothing's wrong with me, except—except my thoughts are caught up in a whirlwind."

"You can turn that off, Kiel," Hinev said. "Listen to me a moment."

Kiel turned to Hinev, suddenly back to himself; the room was still, calm, quiet.

"I'm the last one to come out of it." Kiel suddenly realized, staring at Hinev.

"Yes." Hinev said.

"How long—"

"Nearly a season."

"And the others?" Kiel asked, anxious now; as his emotions rose, he heard faint whisperings again on the edge of hearing, whisperings in the air, thoughts, desires, shards of reasoning—

coming from everywhere.

Hinev watched as suddenly Kiel staggered back, assaulted by memory.

In that moment, Fielikor Kiel became aware of all the thoughts around him, beyond the other serum candidates, thoughts from the world beyond; in that moment he aged a million lifetimes.

The second passed.

Kiel looked up at Hinev, and realized why Hinev's eyes had been full of secrets.

"Now that you're awake, it's time to train you all how to use your abilities." Hinev said.

Kiel nodded, and Hinev led him to a large laboratory, then left to bring in the others, one by one, until there were thirty-one of them.

And they talked and learned from each other, and in the years that followed came to know each other closer than family, even formed mindlinks, and they learned to control their powers, and how to shield their minds from thoughts, and how to survive in a world that was so full of invading memory. And each learned to form a mindlink for the first time, though few of them chose their closest acquaintances, and Hinev himself refused to join them, to allow them to experience his life, for reasons he wouldn't mention; and since Hinev had learned to control his powers long ago, they found they couldn't compel him to open his mind to them, not even Lierva, who tried so hard to reach through the barrier of his mind.

Hinev was a master of telepathy, it seemed, and taught them what he knew, how to control it, how to use it, how to hold back, how to read only surface thoughts, and how to read faces, as though he had more than a mere year's experience in reading thoughts and intentions. And they came to rely on him, to admire him, to depend on him for answers, for advice, even though all realms of thought had been opened to them, for he was the one who had made the metamorphosis possible, who had made it possible for them to see the world around them so clearly, and to know, and know utterly, the entirety of reality as it was in that aeon of time on their world.

Yet none of Hinev's children ever spoke of the metamorphosis. They left that memory behind them, filled their minds with other memories to drown it out, even though they knew they could never forget it or uproot that long nightmare from their memories.

That was part of the price of their immortality.

Chaper Ten

So, the mind transferal operation procedure had failed.

Hinev couldn't do it. Hinev had failed.

Ornenkai would never be able to transfer his soul back into his original human body, unless he was willing to die in it, because Hinev couldn't restore it or alter it with Hinev's serum, any more than he could transfer the mechanized Elders into a body that had already been altered by the serum.

Ornenkai knew what this meant. Ornenkai's greatest hope, a hope he had dared to believe possible since he learned of Hinev's serum, had been dashed to nothing, yet he took the news rather well. When Ornenkai discovered that Hinev's serum had only worked on thirty-one candidates Hinev had grown for the Elders, and that there was simply no way of transferring the Elders' minds into the successful candidates of Hinev's explorers, Ornenkai very nearly lost his temper. He very nearly gave in to a fit of madness and anger. He very nearly gave in to despair, not a heart-numbing despair but a kind of rabid anger that he knew would destroy his soul.

Yet in the end, Ornenkai lacked the courage to lose his own sanity and surrender to his fury. He returned to his senses, became again cold and hard and reasonable.

Ornenkai had come to know great emotions, but he was also a man of reason, and knew that if he was patient, perhaps one day Hinev would perfect the immortal clones that Ornenkai and Marankeil required to be humanoid once more.

When the news about the failed transfers of their minds into the minds of the explorers at last set in, Ornenkai realized that in a strange way, he had been glad to learn that Marankeil couldn't take Kiel's body for himself to become the new home of his soul and mind's memories. Yet now Hinev was telling him that even transfers into immortal clones were impossible? Hinev was giving him some nonsense about the serum not working on clones who had been grown without pre-existing memories.

Ornenkai didn't like to believe that Hinev was lying.

At the same time, according to Hinev, more than a hundred real people who had undergone the serum transfusions, men and women with real memories had been destroyed by the serum; a few had even gone mad like wild animals and escaped. Ornenkai took this news almost as well as the first. Despite what Hinev said, Ornenkai refused to allow that Hinev was unequivocally correct about what could and could not be done. Hadn't the first two serum experiments failed before Hinev was able to perfect it and achieve the metamorphosis? Hinev was just going to have to try again. In the mean time, Ornenkai knew that he could wait, perhaps as much as ten thousand years, as long as Hinev eventually found a way to grant him immortality in a physical human body.

However, at the moment, Hinev could only create identical clones from the Elders' original bodies, modified to age slowly, to last perhaps a thousand years—then their memories could be "channeled" as it were, into the Main Terminus for storage with the Elders' original memories. Giving them new clone bodies once more was the best Hinev could offer them, and though Marankeil and Ornenkai had accepted the temporary transfer into clone bodies, they would accept the transfer only as a temporary measure.

Ornenkai felt the full weight of Hinev's failure as he left Hinev at his laboratory. The two of them had spent a significant amount of time setting up equipment for the temporary transfers in the underground chambers of the nearby Main Terminus, where Ornenkai and Marankeil's original bodies had been stored, and where their memories were linked to a permanent storage unit in the Council of Elders. Now that Ornenkai understood Hinev's transfer process and had been prepared for what was to happen, he had a few errands to finish before the transfer could begin.

The process of Ornenkai's mind's memory transfer into a new clone body from the mechanized unit was going to take several years, 'downloading' as it were, information, and though Ornenkai would be able to interact with the world through his position in the Main Terminus, his mechanized unit wouldn't be able to travel freely until the transfer was successfully completed. Marankeil had already been informed of Ornenkai's impending experimental transfer and planned to wait until Ornenkai's new transfer was a success before following suit.

In the meantime, Ornenkai had news to deliver to Ungarn, news from Marankeil himself that Lieutenant Alessia Enassa, who had gone to train under Ungarn, was to be transferred to the Selesta to become one of Hinev's explorers.

Ornenkai tried hard not to become worked up by thoughts of the explorers' impending mission. Without an immortal body, Ornenkai had accepted that he wouldn't be able to join the explorers, even if he had been able to sacrifice all his obligations to accompany them into space, as he had long dreamed of doing, albeit secretly, ever since he began work on Selesta.

As angry as Ornenkai was by the news that Alessia was to become an explorer, Ornenkai could guess why Alessia was being sent away. Marankeil didn't want Alessia anywhere near him. For some strange reason, Marankeil feared Alessia could and would harm the mechanized Elders in some way. Marankeil didn't want her near Hinev, either. Ornenkai also perceived the reason for that; Alessia was the only one who might be able to interfere with Marankeil's control over Hinev. And, as long as she could be kept away from her mentor-father, she could be used as a powerful bargaining tool to keep the rebellious scientist under control, to keep him working for Marankeil.

Alessia was soon to disappear far out of Ornenkai's reach, perhaps forever.

He was trying not to let this affect his mind and emotional state when he ran into her suddenly in the corridors of the Ariyalsynai Scientific Center.

He didn't even try to avoid her when he saw her coming towards him. He had met her several times since she had grown into a woman and received Hinev's serum, but every time he saw her, the sight of her had a profound affect upon him; the force of her presence never failed to subdue his heart.

She was as wild and untamable as ever, as irreverent and free, hot-headed and willful; being near her had an intoxicating affect upon him. He savored every moment, aware that she would soon grow restive and dismiss herself after a moment's conversation, eager to be away from him. Since she was a child, she had casually dismissed him, even when he attempted to be kind, even though he was always kind to her. Did she imagine that the great Ornenkai was merely kind and oncular, impotent and ineffective, sentimental perhaps? Did she imagine he was someone that allowed others to criticize him so harshly, to make light of his words, to sneer at his momentary display of affection and thoughtfulness?

He was Elder Ornenkai and tolerated no defiance from anyone else in all of the Federation.

Yet he never let her irreverence pain him, because he knew why she despised the Elders. They had taken her from her home. Yes, he could understand her hostility. And he had never let her pain him because she was the only one who had ever so defied him in more than three thousand years. It never ceased to amaze him that she wasn't afraid of him, of Marankeil, of anyone. Only situations intimidated her; people, she disregarded, maybe even foolishly. And Ornenkai couldn't help but wonder if she would always be so aloof.

Didn't her cruelty affect him? he sometimes thought to ask himself.

Ornenkai told himself it did not, but that was only because she never registered his feelings for Alessia. Her complete and utter ignorance of his adoration was the one thing that kept her cruel and indifferent behavior from doing any true damage to him; if she ever suspected his feelings, could he still be so careless and open about showing them? Could he risk her using his feelings against him to gain power and control over him? Perhaps that was why he was able to be so kind to her, so completely understanding of her; she didn't desire power, power over him, because she was so supremely in control of her own self, so perfectly content in her own self, so unconcerned about what other people were doing that she never thought to control anyone else. She could not imagine that a machine man had any human feelings of any kind, much less harbored feelings for her.

Even now, even since Alessia had become a woman, she still didn't know that he desired her deep down, in that part of his memory that knew what it was to be a human man and wished to be one again. But he desired more than her body, he desired her company and her soul, and most of all he desired her approval, if he had admitted it to himself.

She was intellectually brilliant, but for all her intelligence, she couldn't see past the one particular prejudice she had. Recently, however, she had begun to act more kindly towards him as her mind matured and she sensed that his kindness was genuine, as she began to understand that she should be sensitive to such kindnesses and return them with polite consideration.

Ornenkai felt gratified that she had grudgingly begun to see him as a friend, in spite of her own prejudices. He often wondered what she would have thought of him, though, if she knew what he was thinking when he looked at her. And that he had begun to wonder—could she be subdued and won over to his side?

He refused to believe that it was possible, to imagine that it could be done by any other than him.

Every time he saw her, the thought struck him that he had never actually touched her. He began to fixate upon her hair and skin, and was at all times aware of exactly how far away she stood from him when they met.

He had sworn he would never touch her until he became a man once more, and then—then he would reveal his nature to her, his every thought and feeling, his memories and past—but now, as he looked at her, he knew for the first time that she was only a dream to him now, because he would never have her, not if things remained as they were.

She was going away, perhaps forever. She was to be one of Hinev's explorers.

They stopped in the corridor; she started talking about something, but he missed the words, focusing only on her beautiful face, the curve of her shoulders, the poise of her neck, the long, wild, silky hair she refused to style in any way, that arced so lovingly over her breasts.

Finally, she began asking him questions about Hinev and his serum candidates; Ornenkai told her that the explorers were being sent out to Lake Firien to complete their training before the explorer mission could be launched.

As he answered her questions, a part of his mind faced the horror that she was the one creature in all the world that he looked forward to seeing, that he sought out and enjoyed meeting. What would the world be like without her presence in it? He would be alone when she left.

"Is something wrong, Elder Ornenkai?" she asked, her lovely brows drawing together in concern.

"Too many things that I will not burden you with, my dear," he responded, feeding hungrily upon her momentary affection. "Disappointments mount like the fallen leaves, but a strong wind sweeps them all away," he added as quietly as a machine could, mumbling an age-old saying. Why was he forgetting himself? She would return, and by then, Hinev would find a way to grant him immortality in a human body. Ornenkai had only to be patient. Then, he would have what he wanted. Was he not the second most powerful man in all Seynorynael? In the entire Federation? Wouldn't he be able to win Alessia's heart one day?

Yes, he would, he thought. He had never failed at anything important before.

They talked for some time longer when Ornenkai remembered that he was going to deliver the news to Ungarn about Alessia's new post. He left her as quickly as possible, before he contemplated thoughts of rebellion against Marankeil's orders. Then gradually, his mind returned to bitter thoughts about Hinev.

Despite his reverence for the scientist, Ornenkai couldn't deny that in some way, he was almost glad that Hinev was torturing himself with guilt over the failed serum candidates, and working like a madman to find a way to restore them back to life.

Hinev deserved to suffer for what he had done.

For all the suffering he had caused.

"I'm glad I found you, Kellar," Lierva said as she entered Selesta's bridge.

Only two days before Hinev's explorers planned take-off, all of the others were in the lyra forest on board Selesta at the moment, working on installing an artificial weather circulator, where they had been going in and out for the past several days. Lierva had gone there to find Kiel to see if he could procure another hundred Valerian fighters from the Firien City defense center, but Kiel had been busy with his latest project, and she decided not to disturb him.

But thankfully, there were some things she could depend on, even though the ship's systems had been shut down to run the last systems' test and none of the ship-board locators were working. Gerryls was still in his laboratory, and he suggested that she look for Kellar on the bridge. Typical Gerryls, he'd been confused as to why she had not located Kellar either telepathically or on her wrist communicator and tried to telepathically weed out the secret.

She laughed, keeping up her mental barriers, and explained that she had kept it turned off so that no one might locate her and had used her power to keep her presence unknown; Gerryls at last understood.

Gerryls wasn't about to help Kiel either, Lierva knew, since he and Kiel had made a bet that Kiel wouldn't be finished with his weather circulator by the end of the day. Lierva admitted to herself that she had avoided being 'seen' by Kiel in part to avoid conscription. It was bad enough that nearly everyone else had been called in to the lyra forest they had brought on board Selesta to help him. But Lierva was glad she found Kellar on the bridge. If she had reached out to use her telepathic abilities to find him, Kiel would have found her in a heartbeat.

"Oh, Lierva, I'll be done in a second," Kellar said from the systems panel in the center of the bridge near the malfunction monitor. "I'm just installing the power re-routing system. Once this monitor is finished, it will link up with the engine and all of the ship's functions."

"Will all of the energy routes really prevent any power failures?" Lierva wondered, now curiously watching Kellar's final adjustments.

"Hope so," Kellar replied with a grin. "As soon as we engage the engine generators, anyway. There shouldn't ever be a power shortage as long as the generator is running since it runs on string energy."

"Not much chance of it running out of power, then," she observed.

"What brings you here, by the way?" Kellar wondered.

"I just came to ask if you'd contact the defense center and get us another hundred fighters," she said, drawing a finger over the console of the nearby station.

"Why don't you ask yourself?" Kellar shook his head. "It's not as though they won't obey you. You have the authority to request anything you need from Firien City."

"But I'm not in charge here, anymore," she said after a moment.

Kellar shrugged. "You know, it still doesn't make sense to me why you didn't want to be in command or even second-in-command."

"You haven't been in command long enough to understand." She told him.

"No, I haven't." Kellar agreed. "That isn't the entire reason, though, Lierva."

"No." She agreed. What could she say? Would he understand that she didn't want any part of the responsibility anymore? That she didn't want to have to be the one everyone, her subalterns, kept at a distance, that she didn't want to have to worry about anyone else if she didn't want to? She was tired of endless obligations, and of denying her own needs and wants for the common good. Did anyone know how much time it had taken her to recover from her love for Hinev?—no, because she wouldn't let them know. She still loved him now, even though she had accepted the fact that he had been sent to Eneveh while the explorers went out on their mission.

Would she ever see him again?

Did it matter if she did? she asked herself, bitterly. Hinev hadn't wanted her permanently in the end, and so at last, sensing this, she had been able to give up on him. Or at least that was what she was telling herself in order to function normally.

And Celekar, so quiet, so rugged and unfeeling, so hard-faced and unaffected—she thought of all the things he had said to her over the years, warning her about plunging ahead into things, and felt ashamed.

Yet she, Lierva, had run after Hinev like a tame creature after its master.

Why hadn't Hinev been able to love her?

Perhaps because he had no room for anyone in his life but his obsessions; oh yes, she had come to understand so much about human behavior in recent years that she no longer really held a grudge against him for being incapable of loving her, or any woman.

She no longer felt the sharp sting of pain when she saw the ancient holo-still sitting on a panel in his laboratory, a still of the woman who would always have his heart.

But she no longer had any desire to live for anyone else; she only wanted to be free, and Hinev had given her the means to achieve that freedom.

Hinev's explorers were leaving Seynorynael on the spaceship Selesta; Lierva couldn't get away from their home world quickly enough. She was going to the ends of the universe where the name of Hinev didn't exist.

Why wouldn't she stop thinking about him? Why couldn't she hate him?

And why didn't Celekar hate her, now that she knew how he felt about her?

Hinev's serum hadn't answered all of her questions; instead, it seemed to bring more of them to her attention. Infinitely more.

A transmission lit up the holo-monitor. Kellar stopped what he was doing, and both he and Lierva looked up at the projection sphere.

"This is Commander Ungarn. Greetings, Lieutenant Kellar."

"Greetings, Commander." Kellar suppressed a grin; Ungarn had the strangest effect of reducing Kellar to a youth again whenever he was around.

"Please relay this message to Lieutenant Kiel. I have new orders from the council to deliver another explorer to join your crew of Selesta. Lieutenant Alessia Enassa from Ariyalsynai is accompanying me to Firien City, and we will be arriving later this afternoon."

"Lieutenant Alessia Enassa?" Lierva echoed. The name sounded strange.

"Can you tell us anything about her, sir?" Kellar asked.

"She was Hinev's assistant for several years before joining the Martial Scientific Force, and has become one of the most valuable assets to my command." Ungarn said, letting a hint of approval come through. "Her file is in the computer, if you'd care to examine it."

Lierva looked at the edge of the holo-monitor's filed, where a young woman sat looking out the window. Turning aside, she saw Kellar's smile, and cuffed him behind his ear. Kellar didn't object; he seemed to enjoy the attention.

I thought Hinev's assistant was a half-race child, Lierva thought and shrugged.

"Why would Hinev send us another explorer—now of all times?" Kellar asked.

"I don't question the council's orders," Ungarn said. "But Hinev told me that he already trained Alessia for the mission."

"When?" Kellar wondered. This Alessia Enassa hadn't ever made an appearance in their explorer training in Ariyalsynai.

Hadn't there been a problem with the serum? Hadn't that been what Hinev told them when Kiel asked if Calendra could receive the serum, knowing that its gifts would bolster her weak constitution, so that she could be an explorer, too?

If Hinev had been telling them the truth, then why had he given the serum to this Alessia Enassa and refused Calendra?

Kellar could see Lierva eyeing the girl with an expression of complete disapproval, but she didn't seem surprised to see the girl standing there; she seemed, rather, to recognize her in some way.

"I don't know." Ungarn admitted. "Anyway, please deliver this message to Kiel, and I will present my report from the Council to him upon arrival." Ungarn said, and the transmission ended.

"Trained for the mission?" Kellar echoed. "Does that mean she was given Hinev's serum?"

"I suppose." Lierva said, distracted; Kellar looked hard at her, and he knew, he knew what was bothering her, but he didn't let on. Alessia—Lierva already knew about her, and she was already inclined to dislike her.

Kellar knew why, of course; Alessia had something Lierva never felt she had managed to obtain: Hinev's unconditional love.

And had no doubt Lierva would make Alessia suffer for it.

The morning of Selesta's take-off, Kellar found Kiel standing on the bridge shortly before the others were to arrive; outside the viewport, the haunting quiet of the fields of Firien stretched away gold and green. On the bridge, the couldn't hear the winds sweeping over the golden attorea flowers and over the grasses undulating like ocean waves; they couldn't hear the sound of the ceiras birds circling over Lake Firien, beyond the range of sight on the port side of the new explorer spaceship.

"Hey Kiel, what are you thinking about?" Kellar asked, watching him several moments; Kiel had yet to turn around and stood, staring at the land outside, at Firien where they had lived so many years.

"A friend I knew, long ago." Kiel said after a moment.

"A friend? Man or woman?" Kellar said, stepping beside him. His eye found a yilechi running over the field before them; he followed it until it was out of sight.

"My first instructor. His name was Jinderian." Kiel replied.

"Who was he?"

"Who was he?" Kiel echoed.

"You said he was an instructor, but that's not all he was. What did he mean to you?"

"Seriously?" Kiel said tentatively.

Kiel chuckled, shaking his head. "Well then, he was someone who gave me hope."

"Hope?"

"Yes." Kiel sighed. "Before I met Jinderian I didn't know what that word even meant. Call me crazy, but I think that if you take away a man's hope, then you kill the man. Once a man has lost that hope, it takes much more to restore it to him than the initial force of the blow that took it away. Nothing short of a miracle, in fact," Kiel laughed.

"But a man can't lose hope entirely and still want to live, can he?" Kellar asked, confused.

"He can," Kiel disagreed. "He can lose hope and still never lose the instinct to survive, but then he is little more than a wild animal masquerading as a man. If you ask me, our capacity to be sensitive to the needs of others and not merely to care for ourselves is what makes us men and women. Wild animals only care for their own mates and genetic offspring, and they do this instinctively, whereas we can make a choice in favor of showing compassion and mercy, even towards a complete stranger."

"What do you mean?"

"I guess I don't know, exactly, except that I wasn't a complete man and never would have been if I hadn't met Jinderian."

"This Jinderian meant a lot to you." Kellar observed.

"It's partly because of him that I wanted to be an explorer." Kiel shrugged. "Jinderian saved me when I never even knew I was lost—"

"I see. You want to repay that debt by giving hope to others. And what better way than to bring other worlds into our Federation—or to protect those who are here from the unknown dangers out there?"

"Maybe." Kiel said, considering. "I don't know if it's possible to restore a person's hope, but if I can keep even one man, woman, or child from losing it forever, I won't regret leaving Seynorynael today. If I can help civilization by giving it a dream to believe in, a dream of peace, freedom, where every being has the right to live a full and prosperous life, a life without fear of starvation and deprivation, a life of hunger and needless suffering, then that will be my memorial to Jinderian."

"I'm sure he'd have appreciated that." Kellar said, with a sigh, then turned away from the view and sat on the edge of one of the navigational station chairs.

"What's wrong with you, Kellar?" Kiel asked, shrugging off his pensive mood; his eyes took on a mischievous light.

"Nothing," Kellar laughed, noticing Kiel's sudden change. "Did you know that Broah and Vala held a welcoming party for Alessia while we were gone getting supplies?"

"And you're sorry you missed it!" Kiel said with a laugh.

"No, not exactly." Kellar protested. "I was just glad to hear about it from Broah. All the same, I think you'll still need to say something to the others, to Lierva and Mindra at least." Kellar said, shrugging.

"About what?"

"Don't get me wrong, Kiel, I'm sorry that Calendra wasn't able to become an explorer, but you know she wouldn't have survived the metamorphosis, and everyone seems to be holding Calendra's situation against Alessia, so I thought—"

"You thought if I said something about it, then they'd leave her alone." Kiel said quietly, his eyes momentarily clouding.

"Yes."

"You like this Alessia Enassa, do you?" Kiel said after a moment, his eyes narrowing in jovial suspicion. "Because she's a stranger?"

"Maybe just a little." Kellar laughed.

"All right, I'll speak to the others and let them know I don't begrudge her for Calendra's sake, but I can't say it'll do a lot of good."

"Because you do begrudge her, don't you?" Kellar asked.

"I don't want to begrudge her for anything, but that isn't why it won't do any good." Kiel insisted. "I can't force the others to feel the way they do about Enassa, or to feel differently. Besides that, I don't think she needs my help defending herself."

"How do you know?"

"Because something tells me she's able to take care of herself. That she already has."

"Really? How is that?"

"Call it a hunch." Kiel replied.

"Federation reports today confirm the launch of the newest explorer mission on board the starship Selesta." A female voice announced in an even staccato monotone. "The mission was originally anticipated to last only a few hundred years and then return for a new crew, according to the Great Expansion program outlined by the late Marshall Zadúmchov, but an absence of several thousand years has now been projected under the current mission guideline. The thirty-two member crew is expected to further the centipede gate development begun by Kudenka's explorers, the crew of Sesylendae, who returned but a brief ten years ago.

"Many Federation Councilors have expressed concern that the original plan to house one hundred thousand explorers has been discarded in favor of such a small crew, but the Seynorynaelian Council has insisted that its newest exploration team has been fully trained and will be able to complete their mission successfully.

"In reports one of the Councilors was quoted to say that 'the absence of a large crew was necessary in order to leave ample space for future generations, samples and specimens, and the possibility of emissaries sent from other worlds'. But despite Federation concerns and past complaints against the fact that Selesta has an all-Seynorynaelian, the starship Selesta's mission passed in a vote in the Council and left early this morning.

"In other reports, a ship from the mysterious lai-nen system has been lost near the Malddain centipede gate. The lai-nen have expressed concern that there may have been Seynorynaelian involvement in its disappearance, and an inquiry is now under way on Malddain to determine the cause of the ship's disappearance..."

Disconnect signal, Hinev sent the thought to the holo-monitor in his new private quarters in Eneveh, the city to which Marankeil had recently exiled the great scientist after the proposed transferal of minds memories into the bodies of the explorers failed. Pushing himself from the lounge panel, Hinev headed for the door to his one-level dwelling on the outskirts of the small city and went outside to look up into the night sky.

Why had he allowed them to go without him?

He hadn't wanted to obey his orders, but he couldn't, somehow he just couldn't have gone back into space with Alessia, Kiel, Lierva and the others. He wasn't even entirely certain himself why he couldn't disobey the Council, why he hadn't stowed away on board Selesta.

Could it be that he didn't want to face his explorers when they discovered that he had tried to give their bodies over to the Council of Elders? Or would Alessia keep that knowledge a secret? He didn't expect her to; no, he couldn't live among the explorers; he had never been a part of them, and he didn't want to go back into the emptiness of space, away from Seynorynael, into unknown regions of the universe, for so long.

This was his planet, his home, his life, and he wasn't ready to leave it again. Nevertheless, he felt so lost, so isolated now that the explorers had gone. He now wished so very much that he could have gone with them.

Alessia—could he imagine never seeing her again? And Lierva, why had he given her up? He wasn't sure why he had put her at a distance, why he felt the need to shield her from himself, why he hadn't realized how very important she had been to him until he had already broken her heart. Yes, he had loved her, not the same as he had once loved Reneja, but because she was a compelling woman. He had loved her and lost her because he had determined nothing could come of his feelings for her.

Hinev was just going to have to put it all behind him, if he could. There was nothing to be done about any of it now; yet he knew he would be alive when the explorers returned. By then, perhaps, he could look upon Lierva again and feel nothing but fraternal affection.

As Hinev stared skyward, he wondered what was happening on Selesta, if Alessia had been comfortably settled among her new companions, companions he felt certain would take care of her for him. But there were no answers in the sky waiting for him; he stared at the nightly aurora as it began to obscure the heavens; it was so good to behold the night again, as he had at Firien, away from the artificial glare of Ariyalsynai's buildings.

At the same time, he knew he was no longer free, as he had been in the days of his youth; in Eneveh, Hinev had become an outcast, had let himself become an outcast, as though in self-imposed penance for all of the heavy burdens that had begun to weigh upon his conscience.

And Hinev lived alone in Eneveh while the world changed around him, while his closest companions grew old and died, one by one: first Niflan, who, along with Kudenka, had once also loved Hinev's fiancée, Reneja. At Niflan's funeral, Hinev saw again Kudenka and Mindier, a new, different Kudenka who had raised a family in Melacre, a Kudenka who had grown old and gray-haired but had kept the same keen, sharp wit of old times; Hinev was so glad to see him! And there was Mindier, who had been Hinev's friend in the earliest days of training in Ariyalsynai, who had conspired with Hinev to gain entrance into the elite training center in Ariyalsynai. Hinev met Mindier once more at the funeral of Kudenka, and finally it was Mindier who passed on, leaving Hinev the last of the circle of six, the last of their old alliance. And he mourned them and mourned the passing of his youth with them. Hinev then lived in Eneveh alone, as the world changed beyond recognition, until a morning dawned when he decided that he would be an outcast no more.

Chapter Ten

The Ephor War had been over for less than a century when war broke out again within the Federation between the Jankari and their neighbors, the people of Palgirnon. Despite the efforts of a peace-keeping force sent by the Seynorynaelian post on nearby Sekika, the war dragged out for more than four generations, and by that time, the contagion of war swept over the entire Federation. Small battles and rebellions against the Federation and between territories broke out and would not be quelled, despite the controlling efforts of legions deployed by the Martial Scientific Force from a thousand different worlds.

As the Federation grew larger, the wars became more frequent; more than once, entire planets were obliterated by neighboring Federation enemies by the time MSF troops arrived in the warring star systems.

Though the Federation Pact determined that punitive action against the offenders was to be swift and definite, the fire of war still kept igniting among territories holding ancient grudges; one reason was that the MSF found itself torn on hundreds of fronts, which kept the rebellious territories safe for a time, until the offenders had already passed on and their children could not be punished as severely for a crime of insurrection that had not been their own; thus it came to pass that in fewer than three hundred years after the first Ephor War, the MSF could no longer keep order effectively, and for the first time, there was widespread talk of the Federation weakening, of Federation power weakening.

When the rumors at last swept to Seynorynael, Elder Marankeil retaliated in full force.

The Seynorynaelian Council soon issued a decree with the single intent of strengthening the Federation, a decree which conscripted millions of youths from across the more stable territories and brought them to Seynorynael and Kayria and later to the allied planet Goeur for training into the MSF, a decree that introduced a more military and less scientific element to the MSF ranks.

The MSF swelled with warriors trained only for battle, instilled with ideas of glory and honor, and with notions of securing peace and prosperity, warriors who had been promised a significant reward in the restored Federation, a Federation now more concerned with its own survival than with progress. The Valerian fighter soon became a symbol of Federation power, stealth, honor, and glory, and the first wave of Federation retaliation.

No doubt Marankeil's decree would have re-established order in the Federation quickly, had not Hinev's explorers kept adding new territories to worry about from across the Great Cluster. For more than a thousand years after the restrengthening of the Federation forces, the MSF fought to keep the Federation together; then, as the centipede gates continued to bring new territories closer to the Federation, a war broke out between the Federation and several independent civilizations on the far side of the Great Red Nebula.

Federation forces retaliated, even those territories where insurrection had been imminent, as the threat of being conquered by an outside territory loomed over the Seynorynaelian Federation. A two-hundred year war was waged until the Federation defeated its enemy, the Alavians; however, after expending more resources than it could afford to maintain its own stability, the Seynorynaelian Federation withdrew from the Alavians' territory.

Within a hundred years, the Alavians' enemies, the lai-nen, invaded and spread their empire to the very borders of the Federation itself, within the Great Cluster.

Alavian refugees granted political asylum on Seynorynael brought word of the lai-nen for the first time. Little was known about the lai-nen throughout the Federation, but one thing alone was reason enough to cause alarm: the lai-nen Empire was even larger than the Seynorynaelian Federation, and they had also discovered the secret of anti-matter weaponry.

From the window of the Tarkhan transport, Hinev watched the exotic ships of Ariyalsynai's astroport grow larger with each passing second. Already almost two thousand civilizations that Selesta's crew had invited to join the Federation had been firmly established within the Federation of worlds, and peace had been reestablished among the warring territories of the Federation in light of the potential lai-nen threat.

Selesta—where was she? Hinev still wondered. Selesta took years to travel to new star systems and galaxies, but once the ship's string engine had created a stable centipede gate channel linking the newer territories to the constituents secured by Kudenka's explorers, passage through the network of centipede star gates brought the new emissaries to Seynorynael in fewer than six or seven tendays.

Revolutionizing the more primitive new territories occupied most of the time of Federation scientists; the strangest truth about exploration and discovery was that it had the indirect affect of stagnating the progressive development of the home territories; their civilization was so preoccupied with teaching the new territories and controlling them that few people had time to pioneer new scientific innovations, especially with all of the efforts Marankeil had made to stifle genius, in case that genius were to ever be used against him.

Was it any wonder that Marankeil feared the unknown powers of the lai-nen?

Since the explorers' departure, Marankeil and his council had created a fleet of MSF ships using copies of the tachiyon engine of Selesta; in time, merchant fleets even more imperfect than the battleships appeared throughout the Federation. As peace returned, trade flourished among the territories.

Even after more than a thousand years, nothing, no space battleship in the universe, even those detailed in reports brought from the lai-nen frontier, could match Selesta. For at the heart of Selesta was a development no civilization had been able to achieve: the containment of a cosmic string. A cosmic string that had been found in the ruins by Lake Firien, possibly a remnant from the Enorians.

Skeptics on Seynorynael had once said Selesta had been too large a ship to ever break free of surface gravity; because no other ship had the interior engine core of that great ship, Hinev knew that there would never be as large a space-going vessel in all the universe capable of terrestrial landings, capable of traveling through and creating centipede gates. The technology to isolate a cosmic string or singularity was even unknown upon Seynorynael and its Federation planets.

Even the MSF flagship, the Excavion, couldn't outclass Selesta, though it was nearly the same size; the Excavion was the closest attempt at a copy of Selesta, but it couldn't land on terrestrial surfaces at all, which even Selesta would seldom risk. If the Excavion ever landed on a planet, she would be unable to break the surface gravity and stranded there for all time.

Moreover, the cost of reproducing the hull of a ship like Selesta had become so great in recent years, with the supplies of superalloys in such demand, that there was simply no way to build a ship cost-effectively. Even using a fleet of expensive humanroid technicians, it would have taken years to reproduce the hull of Selesta, a hull that had been realized through the efforts of thousands of highly skilled MSF specialists who dedicated long hours to The Firien Project, along with thousands of humanroids. The Federation resources had been stretched thin in some areas, though Ariyalsynai was now swimming in luxury goods and trading vessels from across the Federation.

Not only was the development of large spaceships simply too time-consuming, costly, and inefficient, it was unnecessary now that travel between the nearest Federation worlds was so busy that it often took only days to reach a passenger's final destination on board the smaller space ships. In fact, most of the transport vessels were small, allowing passengers to dock in the space stations near the multi-centipede gates to take a connecting transport, even smaller ships designed for easy and frequent terrestrial landings. Only cargo ships were large, and they were shuttled to moon bases and space stations, where the goods were transmitted down to planetary surfaces on smaller trading ships.

In only a little more than five hundred years since the explorers' departure, the Seynorynael they had known had been swallowed by an explosion of new ideas and cultures from the newly discovered territories. Even in remote Eneveh, Hinev had noticed the changes on their planet in art, architecture, fashion, food, beliefs, species of animals kept as pets, even legends.

Hinev spared a moment to wonder about the cosmic gates, the centipede star gates.

Did Marankeil ever wonder if Selesta could return to the past?

Because of course, the centipede gates were not only links to other sections of the galaxy, but time-portals. Once they had been created, a ship could return through them to any time since the gate had been created, even though most vessels could not pass through Marankeil's ingenious time-check monitors, one of the last great scientific achievements of the demagogue and leader of the Elders.

The longer Marankeil lived, the more he discovered privately and the more formidable an enemy he made himself.

Hinev knew this now that he had lived an aeon how much a thousand years could do to a man.

Had Kiel and Alessia lived as many years already? Selesta could journey until the end of Valeria and beyond and return only relatively few years after their departure through the gate time tunnels that linked space and time. Even if their journey took millions of years, they might easily be home tomorrow. Yet their mission guideline had been short, like the mission of Kudenka's explorers. They wouldn't even have needed to use their string engine to travel across the Great Cluster; even though a thousand years had passed on Seynorynael, Hinev's explorers might have only lived a hundred years, but because of the effects of time dilation, time had slowed down only on Selesta. Time slowed down near the speed of light, and the Selesta was traveling near light-speed.

Hinev had always expected that the explorers would have to break the council's law forbidding time travel. They could not return to the past before Marankeil had become a machine—the laws of the universe forbid time travelers from returning to a past where they had not existsed—though Hinev knew Marankeil's greatest fear was that someone might attempt to erase his existence before he had secured his own mechanized immortality. Kudenka's explorers had not yet created a centipede gate until after Marankeil had joined the council. So, according to the laws of physics which governed the universe, there was nothing for Marankeil to worry about.

It was scientifically impossible for the explorers to destroy the mechanized Elder.

But Hinev often worried that Marankeil might send a force into the past through the centipede gates to eliminate him before he had finished the serum. He reminded himself that he probably worried needlessly; Marankeil would not want to eliminate the explorers—he would be sacrificing his control over the thousands of rich planets that the explorers had discovered.

Surely, no one, no faction of rebellious subjects, would use the gates to return to the past?

And Ornenkai would surely have warned Hinev if Marankeil had ever planned any such venture to alter history, wouldn't he?

Ornenkai wanted Hinev to figure out a way to make the serum take affect upon his original body, after all.

And, Marankeil—could it be that Marankeil also knew of the potential catastrophic consequences of altering fate? Had he taken precautions somehow to ensure his own survival? Hinev wondered.

Hinev disembarked from the transport and headed through the Ariyalsynai astroport, heedlessly traversing between sections. The Mulili aliens regarded him in mute surprise as he entered their lounge without a pressure suit to protect him from the heavy simulated air pressure of Mulil, 2.3 times that of Seynorynael, air pressure which had been created for the Mulili aliens' comfort while they waited for their vessel to be resupplied.

Hinev turned to them and stared at them a moment; they stared back.

"Where is this transport going?" he asked them in the chief Mulili language.

"Kardia. Then Vusdia." One of the Mulili answered, peering closely at the half-race man, though to be honest, he could hardly tell that the stranger was half-race. The Mulili held nothing against half-race Seynorynaelians, who seemed almost the same as a Seynorynaelian to the small, squat race of Mulili.

Half-Kayrian, the Mulili was thinking. But that was merely a terse observation. He and the other Mulili were racking their brains for any idea as to how this half-Kayrian, half-Seynorynaelian man hadn't been crushed by the air pressure without a pressure suit! How was he able to breathe their atmosphere?!!

"How indeed," Hinev said after a moment; the Mulili stared at him even harder, if that were possible.

"Who are you?" the one with the presence of mind enough to speak asked the stranger.

"A man in search of a purpose?" Hinev replied with a slight question. "I take it your people are suffering from a blight this year and can't meet Federation standards for aid unless you can come up with something to prove your planet a worthy investment to the Federation?"

The Mulili man nodded.

"Then I can help you." Hinev said.

"Why?" The Mulili asked. "Who are you?"

"As you insist on using names, you can call me Hinev. Fynals Hinev."

"Fynals Hinev?" One of the other Mulili stepped forward to protest. "But that name belongs to an ancient man. One of the explorers who found Mulil, long ago—"

"Kudenka's explorers." Hinev said.

"Yes," the Mulili man agreed. "Why do you choose that name?"

The others waited, listening intently for a reply.

"Because that name belongs to me."

"You wish to help our people, Fynals Hinev?" the first Mulil asked again, looking closely at him. The longer he looked, the more he began to believe that he had seen the man's face before somewhere.

"Yes, I do." Hinev said.

"You are Hinev!" The second Mulili blurted abruptly. "I've seen your face in the ancient recordings."

The other Mulili turned to him, then back to Hinev.

Hinev nodded.

"Very well, we accept your offer of faith, Fynals Hinev, on behalf of the oath Kudenka swore to our people." The first Mulili said. "But tell me, Fynals Hinev, how does a dead man walk among the living?"

"By taking one small step at a time." Hinev replied.

Ornenkai sometimes stared at himself in wonder as he passed the reflective panel of his new private quarters near the Arboretum Museum, a suite of wide colonnades and multiple chambers, lavishly decorated with only the best furnishings to be found across the Federation.

More than a thousand years had passed since the first successful transfer of Elder Marankeil into his new clone form and a score more had passed since Ornenkai returned to a human body, but a human body that was hardier and stronger than Ornenkai had been as a human, a clone reinforced by artificial muscle fibres and organs, an unbreakable skeletal system, tougher skin tissues and chemically enhanced artificial muscles.

The clone Ornenkai had short hair, without the curls he had known in his youth; his eyes were not quite so brilliant, perhaps, but they were human eyes, wonderfully human eyes. Ornenkai strode past the reflective panel on his way to the even more opulent center of the forum in the Elders' Building and saw himself, mid-stride. He marveled a moment at his own, long human limbs and human gait.

Ornenkai remembered how infinitely vulnerable he had felt in those first moments when he reawakened in a human body, how delicate even this super-strong human shell had seemed to him after years living as a mechanized unit.

However, Ornenkai had since grown used to his new body and all of the comforts and pleasures that being human allowed him once more.

"Well, Ornenkai, I have news for you," Marankeil said as Ornenkai entered the private atrium of the Elders, with its baths, fountains, and gardens, some time later. Marankeil was lying face-down on a panel beside an open pool in the middle of the atrium. He was wrapped only in a half-robe, resting as a young woman worked over his muscles; Elder Baladahn, in clone form as well, was lying on another panel in the same position now far away, by the main baths.

"Oh?" Ornenkai threw back. "Milea!" He called loudly and collapsed on the lounging panels in the center of the room. A lovely young woman adorned in a brightly-colored garment appeared a moment later and brought him a dark red, spiced drink; he took the drink and pulled her beside him. She sat down on the cushioned divan. Ornenkai began playing with the long strands of her hair.

"You don't care about what I have to say?" Marankeil said mockingly, turning aside and sitting up.

"What news?" Ornenkai asked, distracted, following Marankeil's lead in the ancient, slower, more musical dialect of Seynorynael. Milea made eyes at him, listening in enchantment, even though he doubted she caught the entire meaning of what either of the Elders said.

"Hinev is missing," Marankeil replied, in a voice dark and low.

Now, he had Ornenkai's attention.

"Hinev is missing?" Ornenkai echoed, turning away from Milea.

"I thought perhaps you knew." Marankeil added in a serious tone.

"No. I haven't seen Hinev—since he left Firien, ages ago." Ornenkai said, wondering why he felt so suddenly uneasy. For more than a thousand years, during the long wars for order within the Federation, Ornenkai had immersed himself in politics once more and returned to the Council Building, to the affairs of the other Elders; Ornenkai had convinced himself that the only thing which mattered was preserving the Federation and had even made a few trips to Federation planets as part of peace delegations. Ornenkai had tried to forget about Hinev's explorers and about Fynals Hinev as much as possible, except when he and the other Elders had required another clone transfer a few hundred years before.

In the years since The Firien Project, Ornenkai had even fought as a commander in the Excavion in a battle against the Alavians, though quite by accident; Ornenkai was the one being that Marankeil trusted with the most highly classified technological dispatches concerning centipede gate and anti-matter technology. But there had been no need for Ornenkai to leave Seynorynael at all in recent years; in any event, Marankeil preferred having Ornenkai close at hand.

Ornenkai knew well enough to understand what Marankeil had said long ago, that no achievement ever meant anything to the human animal unless there was someone else around to share it with and appreciate it. Ornenkai himself had begun to understand the same; for all he did, the only man or woman alive who understood its full significance was Marankeil.

In a strange sense, without each other nearby, each of them was entirely alone. Not even Maerodach and Baladahn could be trusted or depended upon; for both had been enemies to Marankeil and Ornenkai long ago, before they became mechanized Elders.

Hinev—Ornenkai thought back to those days of the Firien Project; Ornenkai had not thought about them in a long, long time. Hinev had been young in biological years when he created his serum, even though he had been born in a bygone age; what had a thousand years done to Hinev? Ornenkai now wondered. He had only seen Hinev once in all that time, and Marankeil had been present, as had the other Elders; so Ornenkai hadn't got the opportunity to speak privately with Hinev, to see if perhaps, as Ornenkai had once suspected, Hinev was anything like Ornenkai at heart.

No, Ornenkai thought. I am not that Ornenkai anymore, he told himself. In the days at Firien, Ornenkai had experienced a brief period of regret and constant attacks of conscience, as though there were anything to regret! Wasn't power what he wanted and had achieved? Now that he had a human body again, and one that could endure for a thousand years, was there anything he couldn't have if he wanted it? Hadn't he helped Marankeil to maintain the greatest Federation in all the universe?

"So where is Hinev?" Ornenkai asked, his heartbeat increasing slightly in pace.

Marankeil chuckled, narrowing his bright, cobalt eyes on the young woman beside him.

Ornenkai turned to look at her. He often wondered why Marankeil had his serving girls genetically grown with much the same face, a face that was lovely, unusual, but not the most beautiful one that Ornenkai had ever seen.

Why that particular face?

Ornenkai didn't like to look at the women who wore that face, because there was something unusual about the shape of the women's eyes—something familiar about it. Something that unsettled Ornenkai.

Besides that, Ornenkai couldn't understand why Marankeil was obsessed with reproducing that face. Marankeil could have any woman in the Great Cluster that he wanted, and he chose to surround himself with bio-genetically engineered women of modest beauty, and he chose to adorn them only in lilac, and in public showed no outward sign of affection towards them except now and again, when he seemed to forget himself—

"Who knows where Hinev is now?" Marankeil said. "I sent some officers to look for him among the Gildbaturan population of the Azyr province when he disappeared from Eneveh. I'm afraid that Hinev is gone."

Ornenkai wasn't entirely certain why this news disturbed him so much. Was he only concerned about the clone transfers? Given long enough, Ornenkai felt that he would be able to operate the machinery himself to create more clones, if necessary, even if he couldn't fashion a clone body of such superior quality as Hinev's. Why else was he so upset by the news that Hinev had left?

"Hinev's nothing but a fool. If he wanted to do something to occupy his time, I would have sent him to the lai-nen frontier to be a negotiator." Marankeil threw out, a note of irritation in his voice.

"If he wanted to put his telepathic power to good use, we could have used him in the lai-nen talks, that's true." Ornenkai observed. "But I think, perhaps, that Hinev is under an illusion that he owes a debt to the Federation peoples for destroying the lives of the failed serum candidates. And for creating Hinev's explorers."

"Yes," Marankeil said, thinking back, as though upon something he hadn't thought about in a long, long time. "But philanthropy is a fruitless aim."

"I doubt Hinev agrees with that. But at least his sense of guilt kept him under control for a while. He felt sorry for the failed candidates, for what he did to them. That's why he let himself be sent to Eneveh. And he couldn't face his own explorers—in case they judged and condemned him for what he had done."

"Hinev is flawed with a conscience." Marankeil said in a mocking tone, suddenly glaring at the serving girl beside him with a peculiar dark smile Ornenkai hadn't seen in many long years, not since—he couldn't remember when he'd seen it.

"I suppose empathy is at the source of all morality and just action." Ornenkai observed. "That's why Hinev feels so guilty when he should just resign himself to being alive and try to enjoy his life."

Marankeil laughed perversely. "Empathy is still a selfish judgment applied to a selfless observation. Trying to impose his values upon others, and controlling them and their destinies as much as I do. But never mind. I don't want to hear anymore about Hinev's philanthropic purpose. Why should it matter that he makes amends or suffers guilt for what he has done. Tell me something, girl," he said to the serving girl.

"Yes?" She turned, fearful.

"What's your name?"

"Laila."

"Laila, why is it that men delude themselves about their own motives?"

"I don't know. Oh yes, maybe it's bad, I see your point, sir. Maybe we should try to be forthright—"

"You misunderstand." Marankeil interrupted, with an air of superior patience.

"Huh?" Laila echoed, confused.

"I wasn't being critical." Marankeil replied, in a serious tone. "I wanted to know the answer. Because we do it regardless. I myself have done the same thing, and yet I don't know why."

"Oh." Laila said, nodding, still confused.

"Come here," Marankeil said quietly to her; she nodded and came over, allowed him to pull her beside him on the cushioned panel. He touched her hair, her face lovingly, then stopped, distracted, peering into her eyes. Ornenkai watched, as though watching something bizarre and completely unexpected.

Marankeil stared hard at her.

"Give me your hand." He said. Laila presented it to him without a thought; he didn't look at it, though. He was still measuring the expression in her eyes. After a moment, he released her hand.

He leaned forward as though to kiss her and stopped just short of her lips. She made no effort to move away. He pulled himself upright again.

"You would keep no secrets from me, Laila, would you?" he asked quietly.

"No." She said quickly, easily.

He didn't move. "I thought not." He said after a moment. "That's all Laila, you may go." He added, watching her leave, watching every step she took away from him.

"I don't understand you," Ornenkai said.

Marankeil turned to him.

"Why did you dismiss her?" Ornenkai asked. "The way you were looking at her, I thought perhaps she resembled Elera more than the others."

"She does." Marankeil agreed, his eyes widening appreciatively at Ornenkai's perception, even as it irritated him to hear that name spoken aloud. He shifted in discomfort.

"Then why?" Ornenkai's brows drew together.

"There was nothing in her eyes that I wanted." Marankeil replied.

Ornenkai refused to admit that he understood what Marankeil meant by that.

Ornenkai shifted his weight to another foot, waiting in the Elders Building to meet yet another political delegation. Would it ever end? he wondered impatiently.

When they finally arrived, the ambassadors from a planet called Kae-míyah brought with them an inhabitant from a nearby planet near the Gerdor Nebula. Apparently, the Sakaran had been injured and left an outcast on his own world, and the explorer team had brought him with them to nearby Kae-míyah. The Sakaran had been asked to join the emissary shuttle to Seynorynael as a representative of his race, though his own people had been left to live without Federation interference.

The bipedal, four-limbed Sakaran was a strange creature, Ornenkai thought. He towered over everyone by at least two heads, had thick but short tan "fur" and a broad, flat nose, a wide-set pair of blue-green stereoscopic eyes, ears with three small holes, two on the sides and one in the back of his head. His two ball and socket joints attached around a hinged joint in his arms allowing a range of movement that Ornenkai couldn't stop noticing with alarm. And his eight digit hands were surprisingly dexterous, but the vestigial toes had fused together to form a very odd foot.

Ornenkai tried very hard to be hospitable and pretended not to notice any difference between the Sakaran and himself.

The Sakaran turned out to be intelligent but found it difficult to speak Seynorynaelian, yet his understanding of their language was apparent and remarkable—too remarkable to be natural. After thousands of encounters with emissaries, Ornenkai was no longer surprised to learn that the explorers had used their telepathic abilities to imprint a rudimentary knowledge of the Seynorynaelian language and customs on the aliens they encountered. Without the explorers, the process of assimilating the new territories into the established Federation would have taken many years longer.

Unlike their Sakaran neighbors, the Kae-míyah emissaries were true humanoids with a dark reddish-brown complexion, large, fiery mahogany eyes and wonderfully thick, straight black hair. Ornenkai had been present in clone form at the public Federation approval hearing scheduled for their planet, and had voted in favor of acceptance, partly on a whim, because he found the Kae-míyahn sense of style intriguing. Afterwards, one of the Kae-míyahn ambassadors had approached him to express his thanks that Ornenkai, a man whom he understood to be one of the famed Council Elders, had spoken in favor of their planet's approval. Ornenkai never minded being accoladed.

The Kae-míyahn mentioned that he had heard good things about him from the Hanar. Ornenkai hadn't understood at first, but clearly the man was referring to Hinev's explorers who had landed on Kae-míyah. The ambassador invited him to a local relaxation lounge for a drink, where to his delight he found his homeland's native drink already included in the Federation drink facilitator guide. The ambassador was pleased to share a toast in favor of the "Lid-une", his word for the Federation, and the prosperity that it would bring his people.

The Kae-míyahn ambassador had asked many questions about Seynorynaelian technology and industry, the abundance of food and goods, the principles behind the black hole energy mine of Kai-rek that provided unlimited energy to the planet and the many other innovations that had raised the Seynorynaelian quality of life. In particular, he hoped to receive a shipment of hovercraft transports like the ones he had seen flying over Lake Malei shortly before the shuttle arrived in Ariyalsynai. Then the two of them had gotten drunk together, and Ornenkai had agreed to a lot more of the Kae-míyahn requests than he intended before long.

Similar (but sober) requests made to the Federation Council had been growing every year—and the energy input into educating and instructing the territories had begun to decelerate the growth of Seynorynaelian technological advancement. But Ornenkai kept out of most of the political debates and meetings that took place. He personally gave only one top priority rating in answer to the appeal made by the planet Goeur to help protect their cities from windstorms and build strong new cities that would provide permanent, secure shelter.

The Goeur people were very much like Kayrians and Seynorynaelians, after all. More so than some of the other races. Ornenkai again suspected that the Enorians had somehow made it there.

There was also the fact that, when Ornenkai had gone to see the Goeur emissary shortly after his arrival, he had been informed of the many promises made to the Goeur by Kiel's team of explorers. Marankeil overlooked the request in the thousands of others, but honoring the explorers' unauthorized promises meant little to him.

So, Ornenkai persuaded Marankeil to see the potential of the Goeur planet as a future MSF training base and to consider its abundant resources. After that, the project to develop the environmentally unstable surface of Goeur was scheduled to depart in only a year.

Ornenkai shrugged off recollections when the Sakaran asked for a tour of the Council Building; Ornenkai agreed to take the Sakaran and the Kae-míyahn ambassadors around personally.

"Tell Scientists Daevás to send two units of robotic technicians with the project," Ornenkai said to the Martial Scientific Force officer, lieutenant Nikasu, who stood waiting in the long corridor in the delegate's wing of the Elders Building. The launch of the developmental team to Kae-míyah had been scheduled for only hours away, and Ornenkai didn't want the little addition to the order to be inadvertently forgotten.

Nikasu nodded and left; Ornenkai and the others headed the other way. Nikasu slowed to a march, the even sound of his boots clicking down the hallway, interrupted only for a moment.

The woman standing in one of the intersecting corridors surprised him. Nikasu hadn't registered her presence until he passed her by and caught a glimpse of her in his peripheral vision. She stood very still, her head bowed and obscured in the shadows. Her lean frame rested against the wall, her arms crossed across her chest, the uniform she wore one he vaguely recognized, but he could not place it in time.

"What are you doing..." the question died on his lips. He felt the sudden urge to continue, and began walking again. He had already forgotten that he had stopped.

The woman passed by the room Nikasu had left and continued down several corridors, into an adjoining part of the Elder's Building.

There was no sign of Ornenkai. Good.

She continued until she went past several women wearing faces she recognized.

Faces like her own.

She stood stock still in the corridor and almost succumbed to absurd laughter.

Then, as she turned a corner, she appeared again, this time wearing a thin lilac garment.

She waited for a long time in the wide vestibule that formed part of the corridor before the Elders' atrium, until several of the other serving men and women appeared and hurried into the leisure atrium.

Marankeil was sitting by the baths; his clone form very nearly duplicated the man he had been long ago, before he turned himself into a machine.

For a moment, while the other attendants moved to circulate refreshments and masseurs moved in with scented oils, she just stared at him.

In that fleeting moment, she wondered if it were possible to kill him now—

Even as the thought formed, she felt the horrific grip of Space and Time around her limbs, constricting her, suffocating her—

"Didn't you hear me?" she heard him calling her, in the same voice she remembered, a voice golden and clear, like pure honey. "I asked you to bring me a refreshment."

She realized he had seen her, but she couldn't move, not yet.

"I said, 'come here'," he said, repeating himself, even though she hadn't heard. He waited a moment, but she still kept still. The other servants were looking at her with ashen expressions of horror.

Was she mad? No one refused to obey Elder Marankeil if they wished to live!

Why was she even here? she kept screaming at herself. What could she do? Space and Time still prevented her from destroying this man—

And destroying the Seynorynaelian Empire before it had formed. She wondered why she had felt compelled to try again to kill him. Or, could it be—could it be that she hadn't intended to kill him at all?

The room was entirely silent. The other Elders had paused a moment to stare at her, then turned away, uninterested. What was she to them? Nothing, and her life was certain to be ended soon for this display of disobedience.

Marankeil was watching her now, his eyes narrowing to slits.

"Come here." He said, slowly, deliberately.

This time, she found her feet moving towards him.

"Is that you, Laila?" he asked in a strange way as she approached; she stopped a few paces away from him and held out a vacuum sealed container of sherin juice; with a touch of her hand on the correct panel, the lid retracted.

He ignored the juice; he was looking at her face, at her eyes.

"Yes, I'm Laila." She replied stonily, with hostility.

He stood abruptly and took several paces towards her, until he was staring directly at her. She didn't flinch; she let him stare.

Yet there was a manner of defiance in the way she looked at him.

His eyes worked over her expression. The servants watching nearby waited, expecting him to strike her, to order her execution.

He stood facing her, measuring her, then ordered the others to leave the atrium so that he could deal with her. She stood, not retreating a step from him, as the other Elders moved to another leisure area, the servants following behind. Once Marankeil and the stranger were alone, he reached for her hand to pull her to a cushioned panel.

She flinched where his hand grasped the soft skin of her forearm.

He dropped it, with an expression of calculation in his eyes.

"You aren't Laila. Which one of the serving-women are you?" he demanded, in a voice used to being obeyed.

She hesitated. "You can call me by whatever name you choose."

"Then—I'll call you Lacerna." He said, eyeing the juice she put down on the table.

"The shadowed one?" she whispered; he seemed to be pleased by her understanding.

"You aren't Laila."

"No, I'm not."

"I haven't seen you here, I think."

"We've met before, but it has been a while."

"Oh?" Marankeil raised a brow but didn't smile; she noticed suddenly that he had all but lost the capacity to smile or laugh easily, freely. "I take it you do know who I am, then?"

"Yes. Elder Marankeil."

"Then is there something wrong with your hearing, Lacerna?"

"No, I hear perfectly well."

"But you risk your life in disobedience? You—a mere cloned servant?"

"Does anyone ever actually believe that someone else is superior to him—or her?" she returned. "Even a cloned servant is humanoid—as humanoid as you are."

He bristled under that remark, turning a shade darker around his ears.

Then, he laughed; the sound seemed to have an odd effect on her. "True enough." He admitted. "Why do you risk your life?"

"Because I don't agree with what you're doing." She said at length.

"Oh, you don't? What exactly don't you agree with?"

"There are far too many particulars to go into, but in general, I disagree with your methods of maintaining civil order."

"Civil order? Those are rather large words for a servant."

"Perhaps, but I'm not the only one who thinks so. There are others who speak far less kindly of you."

"Oh?" Now he was actively interested. "And what do they say?"

"Some people say you're evil because you destroyed the Alavians for resisting the Federation, and would destroy the lai-nen if given a chance." She replied. "Others say your punitive measures against insurrections are horrible crimes—"

"Are they? People think I'm evil, do they? But you aren't making sense. I have no intention of running away from my crimes as you call them, and I don't mind my own company—no, I don't dwell upon my guilt if I am left alone—I did what was right—"

"Yet you don't enjoy being alone, do you?"

He stared at her and thought of striking her, but couldn't. Why? he wondered of himself. Was physical violence against one person any different from the necessity of political violence against many enemies? And did he care so much about the consequences of either any more?

Or was he so infuriated because she was right?

"Stay here, then. I won't punish you," he said.

"Is that a command or a request?"

"Do as you like."

"Then I'll stay for a while."

"Good." He allowed a half-smile onto his face, watching as she sat down a few paces away. "You're wrong," he added after a moment.

"About what?" She turned to look at him.

"You've never had power or governed an entire population, so how would you know what methods of keeping order and peace are best?"

She was silent, pondering over her protest so long that she lost the desire to make it.

Meanwhile, he approached her and sat beside her in quiet triumph, then began lightly fingering the edge of her sleeve. She flinched slightly as his finger traced a line over the bare skin of her arm.

"I won't hurt you." He said quietly, enjoying just that moment.

Her expression was skeptical.

He smiled faintly at her, pleased by her expression and by all that she was and did. There was something about being near her that eased his bitter feeling of dissatisfaction with the world. He could not remember the last time he had felt so content, as he began playing with her hair, his fingers drawing through it gently.

She didn't move; instead, it seemed she had gone rigid as a statue. Her behavior privately amused him, touched him, but her reserve also struck him as a kind of challenge.

He sat beside her long moments, still playing in her hair and with the fabric of her collar as the artificial breeze stirred between the tree branches of the wide atrium; parven birds chirped idly on the balcony outside that overlooked the main gardens of the Council Building. The tranquillity settled in around them, and the time passed peacefully. The artificial sun in the dome beyond dimmed gradually to golden hues. Marankeil lazily leaned back on the panel, pulling her with him; she lay motionless across his chest, listening to the sound of his breath rise and fall, to the sonorous sound of his heartbeats.

He stared at the curling tresses arcing over his chest and at the soft waves at the back of her head, the arch of her neck; her face was turned away, but her hand, curled into a childishly soft fist, was pressing lightly against his shoulder.

After a long while, he reached forward on impulse to turn her face towards him; she resisted effectively, but he reached forward with the strength of his body to turn her around and succeeded; she struggled to stay still, but he forced her towards him.

He was no longer content to be kept at a distance.

When Marankeil woke several hours later on the sleeping panel, he looked around, but he was alone.

After a moment, he got up and searched the atrium; there was no one. The guards outside had seen no one leave or enter the atrium, but Lacerna had disappeared.

Or had she been just a figment of his imagination? he wondered, only briefly. He knew she hadn't been a dream, for he hadn't been able to dream in more than four thousand years.

Yet the servants had seen her when she arrived; at the same time, none of them knew who she was, not even the grown clones who shared the same face.

She was, he discovered from them, unknown to them.

Chapter

Marankeil has been more irascible than ever of late, Ornenkai thought as he left an official Federation Council meeting. Finding the Tarkhan representatives Gilhakmorg and Cuelim in the third lounge of the diplomats' forum by chance dissipated the dark mood hanging over Ornenkai.

Ornenkai had grown familiar with the couple in the course of their official dealings; yet Ornenkai liked them, especially since their people had shown a keen appreciation for Seynorynaelian poetry and music and Federation culture. Ornenkai would have even called them friends, if he still applied that word to ephemeral creatures.

Why Ornenkai liked Gilhakmorg and Cuelim was the same as why he liked their race. Most of the Federation planets worried about what they stood to gain in terms of technology and material comfort first when they joined the Federation; the Tarkhan people were different. They had primarily looked for their souls to profit from new forms of art and literature. And Ornenkai could appreciate people who cared for art and excellence; a desire to profit was only natural, enjoying luxuries were well and good, but profit gluttony for the sake of profit gluttony alone, without an eye for taste, and without the taste to properly appreciate how best profit could be put to good use—the thought quite simply nauseated Ornenkai. He didn't want to judge, but he couldn't help what he really felt.

Ornenkai had to admit that he hardly understood the Tarkhans's ideas of good literature and art, though, but of course that was because of their genetic and genetically-derived cultural differences.

The bi-pedal Tarkhans were not humans or humanoids but were bi-peds. They had a light, leathery grey skin with splotches of white hair concentrated on the face and feet, small ears and noses with one tiny nostril, and they had clear, wide blue-grey eyes, narrow faces and long legs. The planet Tarkhan was as cold as Seynorynael, and the Tarkhan people that came to Ariyalsynai adjusted easily to their new surroundings; many did not even require condensed atmosphere packs to breathe and adjusted to the slight difference in Seynorynaelian air pressure and content.

The Tarkhan representatives were interested in the many dramas being brought to life across the Federation, based on ancient Seynorynaelian lore and legend and upon cultural stories from thousands of worlds brought to Ariyalsynai, the center of the Federation's trade routes and a frequent stop-over between centipede gates. Ornenkai had escorted them to Kilkor, where several plays had been given based on early Gildbaturan wars. The plays intrigued the Tarkhan couple, whose own people had outlawed war almost three hundred Tarkhan years ago.

"I must tell you, Ornenkai, it disturbs me that the Council has voted in support of an attack on the lai-nen Empire," Gilhakmorg said as Ornenkai sat on a lounge chair beside him and punched in the code for a Malddain friasti. Both Gilhakmorg and Cuelim had been present at the Federation Council meeting as cultural correspondents, since their planet didn't have an official vote in the Council yet.

Not all this bother about the lai-nen again, Ornenkai thought. Why can't we just sit in peace? Was everyone in the world talking about the lai-nen? Weren't there other things going on in the Federation?

Ornenkai looked askance at the Tarkhan man, but the other could read nothing in the Elder's expression. Ornenkai knew that Gilhakmorg had instinctively trusted him since shortly after their first meeting twelve years ago. Ornenkai accepted this fact impartially, but he was still trying to determine why Gilhakmorg or anyone would trust him, Elder Ornenkai.

Nevertheless, there was still something dark in Ornenkai's eyes that perhaps Gilhakmorg didn't entirely discount. This man had seen and done many things no ordinary being had, Gilhakmorg thought often; even if Gilhakmorg had never learned of Ornenkai's mechanized incarnation or multiple clones transfers, he had still recognized something unsettling, something resilient and uncompromising in Ornenkai's eyes.

Ornenkai never gave away any emotion, perhaps because he had spent so much time as a machine. For all of his superficial humanity, he moved and spoke as though he were still a mechanized unit, and it was precisely his inhumanity that kept others at a distance. And his inhumanity never shone clearer than in his visual organs, his yes, the mirrors to his soul. Gilhakmorg often worried that perhaps the concept of sin meant little to the Elder now.

Ornenkai saw Gilhakmorg's thoughts even without a link-up to his telepathic mechanized unit and suppressed an urge to laugh. He found it easy to read thoughts through facial expressions, but then he had grown skillful through years of the mechanized unit's telepathic ability.

Gilhakmorg, bless him, he didn't understand the necessity of Ornenkai's reserve. Ornenkai knew that if he let others see his emotions, Marankeil might also be able to see some emotion in him that even Ornenkai wasn't sure was there, and Ornenkai couldn't let that happen. Showing the emotions one felt made one vulnerable to the designs of others; Ornenkai believed this in his soul.

"Tell me, Gil, have you ever met a lai-nen native?" Ornenkai asked, turning to the Tarkhans with a meaningful gaze.

Gilhakmorg's wife, Cuelim, looked up from her drink, a curious expression on her face.

Gilhakmorg shook his head.

"Well, I have," Ornenkai said.

"You've seen one? What do they look like?" Cuelim asked.

"Merely quadruped creatures like us, and they do walk upright, despite what you may have heard," Ornenkai continued, glancing between them, "they've got large legs and extremely short arms—and I think, my friend, that even you would find them quite frightening." Ornenkai paused as he sloshed the drink in his hand with a circular motion then contemplated the swirling contents. Finally, he raised his other hand before them and flexed his fingers.

"Frightening?" Cuelim echoed. Of course, the tales about the lai-nen had been frightening people across the Federation for uncounted years, but to hear Elder Ornenkai admit this drove that fact home more than anything else could.

"Indeed." Ornenkai nodded. "The lai-nen have only four fingers and toes, but they're agile and fast, faster than they might seem. They can rip apart a humanoid or bi-ped in less time that it takes us to snap our fingers."

"Really?" Cuelim said, shaking her furry white head.

"Don't let the fact that they're descended from plant-eating creatures fool you." Ornenkai added. "All of the biologists are talking about them—how their species was a plant-eater that then became a successful predator-scavenger millions of years ago, as it was developing."

"So I've heard." Gilhakmorg nodded. "Yet aren't they now omnivorous, like your people?"

"Yes," Ornenkai said. "But I believe they prefer meat to vegetables," Ornenkai laughed. "And they will take their meat fresh, if you understand. With its heart still beating."

Cuelim made a face that Ornenkai recognized was a grimace for one of her people.

"Well, what they look like... " Ornenkai continued. "Ah yes, I believe that the lai-nen's' physical defenses would also impress you."

"I've heard about the shoulder horns. True?" Cuelim asked.

"Yes," Ornenkai said. "The horns are vestigial, left over from the defensive plating of their ancient herbivorous ancestor. Likely their tough, leathery khaki skin is also something they kept from that peaceful ancestor. Superb natural defenses and superb natural offenses—paints them as an awfully frightening creature, doesn't it?" Ornenkai laughed.

"Do they really have such a large head?" Gilhakmorg wondered, setting down his drink. "And what about that business of fantastic forward-set eyes for depth perception?"

"True," Ornenkai said.

"I heard they have long retractable claws and sharp front teeth for ripping up carcasses." Cuelim added.

"Again, true." Ornenkai said.

Cuelim didn't flinch but considered what Ornenkai had told them. "How can a race that threatens peaceful life manage to create an Empire that spreads from the Black hole Elmries in the Lysciena cluster to the Great Red Nebula?" she asked.

"For all of their hostility, reports indicate that the lai-nen are a highly intelligent race," Ornenkai admitted, "but it is precisely the threat of lai-nen retaliation that keeps many of their subordinate territories under control."

Cuelim was silent.

"Still," Ornenkai added, "the lai-nen Empire traders that we permit into our Federation area have been carefully selected by the lai-nen Empire. So of course they won't tell us much about any resistance to their domination."

"You think there's more going on than they tell us?"

"Perhaps," Ornenkai replied. "On the surface it seems clear that most of the territories, even those with humanoid populations, appear content."

"What if they aren't?"

"I think the lai-nen don't harm humans or humanoid beings because they took so much away from the exchange of cultures," Ornenkai said, "and the humanoid traders that we have encountered assure us that the lai-nen have brought peace and prosperity to the Lysciena cluster."

"Then why attempt to destroy the lai-nen civilization?" Gilhakmorg was insistent. "They have a right to their own existence, no matter how the Federation feels about them." He repeated his argument on principle alone; Ornenkai saw that Gilhakmorg had little respect for the lai-nen per se.

"Maybe so." Ornenkai admitted.

"I've heard they have the vast resources of a hundred planets at their disposal." Gilhakmorg threw out, then took another drink from his friasti.

"Yes." Ornenkai nodded.

"Well then, what if they should defeat our Federation forces and then launch an attack on a Federation planet?" Gilhakmorg wondered.

"They'll put up resistance for while—perhaps for several generations," Ornenkai said slowly, ponderously, "and I can't guarantee that they won't take a few of our territories with them, but death is only a matter of time for them. Nothing will remain of lai-nen."

"But why?" Cuelim asked. "I haven't heard that they're a threat to the Federation."

Ornenkai looked down into his drink, a light smile forming in the corners of his mouth. "I don't doubt it. But Marankeil has considered the lai-nen a threat ever since we learned of Kudenka and his explorer's journey to the lai-nen border worlds just beyond Alavia," he said, watching the Tarkhans' reaction from the corner of his eye.

"The lai-nen are cunning," he continued, "but even though they have been very careful never to provoke us, we have known they don't like the Federation ever since they began to send ambassadors to Seynorynael. If the opportunity ever arose for them to attack us—if war should ever break out among the Federation planets—then you can be sure that the lai-nen will be ready to take advantage of our weakness."

"But surely they wouldn't defeat us." Cuelim said.

Ornenkai laughed. "Alone, probably not, but as I said, if we were already fighting another battle—maybe they could, Cuelim. While we might be able to bring any of our own conflicts under control, we don't know how the lai-nen factor might unbalance the situation. So Marankeil has decided never to give them the chance to conquer us."

"So it seems we must destroy them first, if we are to ensure our own security." Cuelim reasoned.

Ornenkai nodded.

"If you are in favor of the attack, why then did you say nothing at the Council meeting?" Gilhakmorg asked.

"And what was all that about a shuttle?" Cuelim added.

Ornenkai shrugged. "Ah yes, the shuttle. Elder Baladahn had the idea of staging its destruction in lai-nen airspace. Then we would have a legitimate reason to retaliate against their empire—"

"You mean the destruction of the Lil-nandia was deliberate?" Cuelim asked.

"Yes—it was an idea that Baladahn took from a past experience with the lai-nen." Ornenkai replied. "The lai-nen have never trusted us, either, and when a ship from the lai-nen system was lost near the Malddain centipede gate many, many years ago, they blamed us for its disappearance. The investigation later revealed that one of their own territories had launched the missile that destroyed the ship in order to claim compensation."

"I didn't know." Cuelim said in surprise; Ornenkai eyed her patiently and waited until she was listening again.

"Few people do—it's ancient history, after all. But the Lil-nandia was set to self-destruct, leaving no evidence behind..." Ornenkai explained. "It doesn't really matter, though, because as you saw, the Federation is eager to get rid of what has long been Seynorynael's greatest rival. They aren't especially interested in sorting out the truth or proving the lai-nen Empire's innocence."

"You should have said something, Ornenkai," Gilhakmorg shook his head. "If you knew the lai-nen weren't at fault, your voice would have dissuaded the others."

"That may be," Ornenkai admitted with an air of complete indifference, "but frankly," he laughed, "I don't care what happens to the lai-nen. And I want to see them dead."

The Seynorynaelian Federation defeated the lai-nen Empire after more than five hundred years of war. The victory celebrations over Seynorynael's latest heroic triumph lasted more than a generation, and from the Great Red Nebula to the edge of the Great Cluster and beyond, most of the former territories of the lai-nen were incorporated into the Seynorynaelian Empire.

The lai-nen home world just beyond the Great Red Nebula was destroyed, but reports from that area indicated that the lai-nen had fled and rebuilt their home elsewhere, that the lai-nen were lying low, perhaps to build their strength. The Federation Council scoffed at the rumors and denied that it was possible; the Seynorynaelian and Federation peoples were happy to believe that the lai-nen were truly extinct.

Yet Marankeil did nothing to see if the rumors were true; the new lai-nen home world itself, was rumored to be far away, beyond even the Rigell system, too far away for an effective assault; Marankeil never wasted any effort. Keeping the peace in the enlarging Federation was enough difficulty for a small planet such as Seynorynael; protecting the home world from planet destruction assaults by rebellious nations, renegades, and space pirates was now enough of a problem at the moment, without going after the last of a vanquished nation.

Hinev, time is growing short for me. Where are you? Ornenkai wondered one afternoon, as he had on so many other afternoons, his clone form seated under the lyra tree in the Seynorynaelian Arboretum. Ornenkai often retreated to the Arboretum, the arboretum museum, his favorite place in the city. It was the only place to find any peace in all the city, the only reality that followed natural law alone, for the laws and society of mankind meant nothing there.

Where was Hinev? Where had he been all these years? Ornenkai didn't know and he could think of few reasons that the scientist had to return to Ariyalsynai, but Hinev always returned to Ariyalsynai. Ariyalsynai was the capital of the universe. The only thing left to consider was when he would be returning.

Ornenkai's own motive for anticipating Hinev's return was entirely selfish. If he and Marankeil were compelled to return to mechanized form as their clone bodies neared expiration, Ornenkai was afraid to risk what remained of his humanity in the mechanized unit; he no longer wanted to try to recreate the clones himself, and live with the imperfections he knew they would have if he fashioned them.

Shortly after the defeat of the lai-nen Empire, Marankeil had decided to send a summons across the Federation for the scientist calling himself Fynals Hinev to report to the council in Ariyalsynai. It was no secret that of all the Elders, Marankeil needed a new clone embodiment the most because a degenerative illness had struck him, but no one aside from the Elders knew that their chief super-cloning expert had disappeared.

In Hinev's absence, the Elders would have to make do with inferior clones with unenhanced physical and mental abilities, and Marankeil would return to his mechanized unit before it came to that. He needed Hinev and his secrets to continue to function in his preferred form, but it had been more than two thousand years since Hinev had been seen.

The world that had known the scientist had changed since then, and Hinev's name was a word forgotten by all but a few. Even the explorers, Hinev's explorers, who continued to incorporate new civilizations had been largely forgotten about on their home world of Seynorynael.

And now, Marankeil and Ornenkai wondered if Fynals Hinev would ever be found.

Yet Hinev would return, of that Ornenkai was certain. Hinev would not miss the opportunity of a reunion with his former pupil, Alessia, when Hinev's explorers finally returned. Ornenkai himself tried not to think about the possibility that Hinev's explorers and Selesta had encountered some hostile species in outer space that even they could not defeat, that could possibly defeat them. He believed that they were still alive, that something hadn't gone wrong with the metamorphosis, that they hadn't gotten lost to a faraway galaxy and been doomed to wander forever across time and space.

But Ornenkai had spent more than an aeon trying to forget about them, to forget about Alessia.

He thought he didn't care if Selesta ever returned. What was a spaceship to him now when he could have anything in all the Federation that he wanted? When his word could destroy or save entire planetary populations?

She heard them coming. Light footsteps sounded in the pedestrian zone that surrounded the Federation Council Building, adjacent Arboretum, and other Council buildings in the center of Ariyalsynai. The creatures that had appeared in the pedestrian courtyard were tall, slender humanoids, their faces obscured by the black helmets that protected them from Seynorynaelian air.

Her mouth worked into a faint smile; she would have mistaken them for the regulator squads of the distant past, if the regulation units hadn't been disbanded in favor of MSF guards.

The leader of the black-clad unit called out softly in an alien language that the interloper had never heard, signaling the others to follow. It was the middle of the night. Only a few wandering android units patrolled the dimly lit streets; weapons had not been permitted in the city for more than five thousand years.

As the group of aliens began to move towards the steps to the Federation Council Building, a shadow stepped from the intersection ahead and raised an arm.

"Stop," a female voice called in the language of Eretae. "I won't permit you to go any further." A black-clad woman said, standing erect, facing them, but she wasn't one of them; her uniform had strange hypnotic blue-green swirls down the sides.

"Who are you?" the leader, Dmerrk, demanded.

The shadow refused to answer.

"How can you speak to us in Eretae!?" Dmerrk asked, paling; the other Eretaens just stood, dumbstruck. The creature had spoken to them in Eretaean—yet Eretae hadn't yet been discovered in this time!

"Are you an Elder?" Dmerrk asked, remembering rumors that the mechanized Elders could read minds.

"No," the stranger said.

Dmerrk stared at her a moment. Who else could she be? he wondered. The Eretaean annals said that there were only thirty-one Seynorynaelian explorers capable of reading minds, and they were gone on their mission at this moment in the past—

"Get out of our way," Kfarrn said, taking a step towards the building.

Fool! Dmerrk thought. Didn't Kfarrn understand that she should never underestimate an enemy? Yet Dmerrk understood her hostility. They had overcome impossible odds to get here, and Kfarrn wasn't about to give up, no matter who this strange intruder might be.

It had taken careful planning for more than three years to steal the Seynorynaelian Empire's Grand Fleet vessel, the only ships capable of bypassing the time checks and using the centipede star gates to return to the past. The Eretaen renegade military unit had understood that if they succeeded in killing the Seynorynaelian Elders in the distant past, there would be no future Empire, only the Federation, and the prosperity and security it had once guaranteed for all worlds.

They were going to change the future, even if it meant they would be obliterated from existence by doing it.

"I can't allow you to alter history." The intruder continued, undaunted as the group of twelve slowly took steps towards her.

Dmerrk was stunned. How—how did this stranger know exactly what they intended?!

"Yes, I know what you intend to do." She said, looking Dmerrk directly in the eye. "You have come from the future to assassinate the Emperor before he ever creates the Empire that will engulf your world."

Dmerrk nodded weakly.

"You must abandon this foolishness." The stranger said. "The responsibility for the destruction of the Seynorynaelian Empire is not your problem—it is mine."

Dmerrk's breath caught in his throat. Her responsibility? he thought. What foolishness! Yet how did she know about the future?! Could she only be foretelling what would inevitably happen, or did she really know? Her confidence in her own assessment of their motives surprised and intrigued him. But perhaps she had guessed accurately about the formation of the Empire because she knew what Marankeil had planned, or else—perhaps she really was an Elder herself.

So, Marankeil, one of your own would steal your throne, he thought. Well, whoever you are, your plan failed—I've never heard of you in the future. Marankeil is the Emperor. Whatever coup you're planning, you didn't succeed. At the same time, Dmerrk knew that if this Elder had managed to overthrow Marankeil, Dmerrk wouldn't be upset, except that anyone to replace Marankeil might have been just as bad for his people. Any temptation he had to help her or leave Marankeil's destruction to this woman quickly died. She only thought she could see the future, and imagined herself a part of it. But in his future reality, none had deposed the Emperor.

No, this intruder could not see the future—she could not know about the atrocities committed by Seynorynael's future Emperor and still stand in their way.

"Do you know what the Empire has done to our people?" Dmerrk asked, hoping to reason with this stranger to let them pass. Her intrusion could put their mission in jeopardy. "What it has done to all of the other worlds across the Great Cluster and the seven galaxy groups?" He persisted.

"The Council are thieves and murderers. They have eradicated entire civilizations who would not join them and murdered billions among those that did succumb to Empire rule—any world that maintains a resistance faction, no matter how minor, lives under the constant threat of Empire retaliation. The Empire controls all aspects of its subjects' lives. We can't move from one territory to another without special permission—and then others are forced to relocate to another planet against their will.

"And the Seynorynaelians themselves are no longer safe in my time—Marankeil sends them to other territories and murders millions in the provinces on this world when he imagines them to be of some threat to him. I won't say that his actions here distress me greatly, for the Seynorynaelian people have lived for thousands of years on the backs of the territories in my time, but I object in that such treatment of his own people proves the Emperor's cruelty and indifference to humanoid life. A creature such as him must be stopped."

The stranger shook her head.

"I understand your feelings, but I still can't let you alter history."

"Who are you?" Dmerrk demanded. "Are you an Elder?"

"I am Selerael." The woman said quietly.

At that moment Kfarrn launched herself at Selerael, brandishing a gun.

Selerael raised a black-clad arm, rigid as a steel bar towards the Eretaen woman racing towards her. Kfarrn was blown back to the ground by a blast of pressurized air, her laser gun clattering away on the steps.

Selerael eyed the rest of the unit.

"Selerael, let us pass. We must destroy the Emperor." Dmerrk said. "We must alter the past."

Selerael shook her head slowly.

"Space and Time won't let you," she said. "And I, as their instrument, will not allow you to. If you try, you will be crushed into oblivion. I am here to save your lives from such a fate before it is too late."

Dmerrk only shrugged.

Selerael regarded his gesture with a trace of sadness, but she also saw that there was little point in arguing with Dmerrk. The Eretaens' anger would let nothing stop them. If she were them, she could have done no less, she thought, but she already knew that their coup would not succeed. She could only save their lives if she could persuade them to turn back, and they would only do that if they knew that the Empire would someday be crushed.

"You can't destroy Marankeil this way." Selerael warned them. "I tell you again go back or you will be destroyed." She thought of the Martial Force's officers on patrol in the Federation corridors and the thousand checks and protective measures that lay between these revolutionaries and their target. They would never succeed past those checks, even before Space and Time took measures against them.

"Why should we listen to you? What have we got to lose?" Dmerrk demanded. "Whoever you are, why should we believe that you care anything about us? Especially if you protect the Emperor from us?"

Selerael laughed roughly and removed her helmet, letting it fall to the ground.

"I am not an Elder, now can you see?"

"You're—Seynorynaelian." Dmerrk observed, staring at her. "An MSF guard perhaps?"

"No, and you can see that I'm not, can't you?"

"Perhaps. But then why are you here?"

"To ensure what has to be. I don't expect you to understand, but—I swear to you I will end the Council's reign," Selerael said. "You can't do it."

A few of the Eretaeans looked from one to another, temporarily confused. But the two leaders, Dmerrk and Kfarrn, ignored the intruder. Instead of backing away, Dmerrk took several steps towards the interloper. Even if she were an Elder, she was only one against many. They would pass her easily.

Or so they thought.

Then suddenly, Kfarrn shrieked as the intruder reached out with arms that moved faster than a human could, grabbing hold of the leader in a cold grip.

To his surprise, Dmerrk found he couldn't struggle. He turned his head aside to look into the stranger's eyes, and they sent an involuntary shudder through him while his mind also struggled to remain calm so that he might think clearly. "Who are you... to tell us to leave?" He asked, voicing the first thought that came to him. "Why should you care what the Empire has done to other worlds?"

"If I tell you my thoughts, Marankeil will draw them from your mind as you die in your attempt, and then your effort will truly fail," Selerael said, wishing the Eretaens would only listen to her advice and act upon it. "Please, you must leave." She insisted again, this time for the last time.

Then Selerael pushed Dmerrk back to the others and spread her arms to create an energy barrier to bar their way.

Dmerrk gasped as the creature that stood before them began to glow with a faint light, her hair buffeted about her by invisible electricity, and for a moment he paused, wondering what she planned to do to them.

"Retreat from this area at once," a strange Seynorynaelian voice interrupted the confrontation. Dmerrk watched surprised as the female stranger flinched at the approaching sound of the voice, and the energy surrounding her faded.

So, we've found your weakness, Dmerrk laughed to himself. You're afraid of being found by the MSF, too!

"Run," the stranger said quickly, urgently, already beginning to retreat from the sound of approaching voices whose owners were still hidden by the velvet night. Selerael's upraised arm waved the Eretaens to follow her, but the Eretaens stood their ground. "It is an MSF regulation force," Selerael continued urgently, "and they will kill all of you if you remain before the Federation Council Building." Her desperate voice had grown to a shout, but Dmerrk shook his head for her to stop.

They had come here for a reason, and there was no returning to the future. The Eretaen ship had been set to self-destruct, and the fragments would soon be confiscated. After an examination, the Federation would know that a future vessel had returned, though with any luck, the Eretaens had succeeded at least in keeping any information about the future from reaching Marankeil. Dmerrk wanted to ensure that they had not in fact created the Empire they went back to destroy.

Dmerrk gave a signal, and the team rushed forward. If the MSF regulation force had already been alerted, then the team must go as far as it could.

Selerael watched from a distance as the Eretaen revolutionary team was surrounded. She knew she couldn't interfere or else risk discovery, as much as she wanted to step in and save the Eretaens forcibly; she had done all she could to warn them, without forcing their hands, without taking the power of choice from them. They had chosen their fate, to meet their death in their cause.

Selerael pitied the Eretaens, yet she knew she could never let Marankeil know of her powers until the moment she could execute the Council's destruction. For Marankeil was clever, clever enough to have made Selerael's future task nearly impossible. The Elders had never been completely assembled in order to prevent an attempt on their lives all together, and Marankeil's two back-up mechanized units wandered the territories, making it impossible for her to destroy all of the Elders at once, even if she could, even if she could destroy the strong humanroid guards of the Council Building that even Hinev's explorers had acknowledged as potentially formidable adversaries.

Selerael's eyes were drawn to the Eretaen leader Dmerrk as he attempted to press through the Martial Scientific Force regulators, but as more squads arrived, one by one, the revolutionary force was slaughtered on the yellow stone steps of the Council Building.

The sound of a MSF regulation force warning siren outside drew Ornenkai from sleep. He had taken residence in a building near the Arboretum, the arboretum museum not far from the Federation Council Building, but the usual quiet of the innermost city sector contained within the soundproof Council dome had been disturbed by a strange commotion.

Ornenkai wondered if perhaps a shuttle had crashed onto the council dome above, but realized that the echoing voices had come from below. In a moment, he rushed outside to his balcony to overlook the pedestrian zone and see what had happened. Several regulation squads had amassed outside the Council building, their laser guns still glowing from the extreme heat contained within the barrels.

A dozen or so bodies lay on the wide stone steps of the building. Ornenkai squinted in order to try to identify their world origin, but could not tell from the dim light, his position so far away, and from what little unburnt flesh remained. Then, as he was considering returning to his quarters, he spied a figure far to the right of the Council building. The observer appeared to be female, and stood with her profile facing him, watching the scene.

Ornenkai's breath caught in his throat as the figure began to move away towards the shadows, and a random beam of light cascaded across the observer's face.

It can't be— Alessia? Ornenkai thought at once, his heartbeat suddenly pounding in his chest; did he just want to see her, or was that really her? But how? Was it scientifically possible for her to be here?

Creator above, how his heart was pounding—he could hardly believe it. He had never seen Alessia as a human and felt his reactions to seeing her. He wanted to shout, to cry out, to purge the agony churning in the bottom of his heart—where had it come from? What was happening to him so suddenly, after so many years of contentment?

Had he truly been content these past three thousand years, though? he wondered.

As he stood between the marble pillars of his balcony watching the strange woman far below, she made a gesture that left little doubt in his mind; oh how intimately he knew her every gesture. Yet—he tried to force away the feeling that there was something different about her. He had seen this gesture before long ago, when Alessia still lived at the Federation Science Building, before she left Hinev to join the Martial Scientific Force. It had to be her.

It was some time before he processed the significance of her presence, that it meant she had somehow journeyed back in time, or else she could not be in two places at once.

He had no such thoughts at that moment.

Ornenkai hurried into the elevation device and down to the streets below. By the time he emerged into the pedestrian zone, the only sound to be heard was the slap of his feet against the ground and the sound of his own breath in the cold night air, his voice calling out into silence. The intruder had disappeared.

Ornenkai was not the only one who had witnessed the confrontation on the steps of the Council Building. As the regulators dispersed, a shadowed figure had retreated into the entranceway.

So, the shadow has found me again. But it won't destroy me. It can't destroy me now.

But in his heart, Marankeil was afraid. He turned from the sight, hurried away from the shadow. And for the first time in aeons, Elder Marankeil found himself heading towards the Arboretum.

He stopped as a rain shower descended heedlessly onto him, onto the cold, near-human shell standing under a sedwi tree.

Chapter Eleven

Four armed guards of the Martial Scientific Force escorted the half-race man on the shuttle that would take them to the Federation Science Building. The corridors of the ancient science center were filled with curious on-lookers hoping to catch a glimpse of the man who claimed to be the famous scientist of long ago, Fynals Hinev himself, who had disappeared more than two thousand years ago.

He certainly looks the part, one of the scientists observed as the strange assembly passed by. The dark hair and violet eyes of the half-race man betrayed Kayrian as well as Seynorynaelian heritage. He had answered an old summons for any scientist calling himself by that name to report to the Council, that much the scientists knew. Word had circulated early that morning when the strange communication had been received, transmitted from Ariyalsynai's main astroport.

Ornenkai was already waiting in a private atrium.

The half-race man smiled to himself as he approached the door, memories of long ago returning to him.

The guards remained behind as their charge entered the room. Ornenkai was seated on a chair in the lounge area. But Hinev recognized nothing in the room. Everything that he had once owned had been removed.

But Marankeil didn't find the serum, Hinev laughed to himself. I used it all. All of the serum secrets were locked in Hinev's mind—and what little he had imparted to Kiel and Gerryls. He had never made any written calculations—he would have no one follow his experiments.

"So Hinev, you have returned at last," Ornenkai said.

"Yes," Hinev nodded. "I couldn't stay away any longer, but you knew that."

"I did." Ornenkai admitted.

"So tell me, my friend, how is your health these days?"

"Don't jest with me," Ornenkai said in a low tone.

"Pardon me." Hinev said, with a bare hint of a smile.

"Where have you been?" Ornenkai asked.

Hinev's eyes clouded over. "To purgatory and beyond."

"I'm serious, Hinev. Where have you been?"

"I've been out admiring your handiwork."

"What handiwork?"

"The work of the Seynorynaelian Federation. It's quite an achievement, what you've done to establish order and prosperity across this great galaxy of ours."

"Yes, I suppose it is. The era of intergalactic wars is nearing an end—"

Hinev laughed. "Perhaps for now."

"What is the matter with you, Hinev?"

"I should ask the same of you, Ornenkai."

"There is nothing wrong with me."

"Truly? But, Ornenkai, you've become so political. Don't think I haven't seen what you've been up to all these years, how unjust you and your Council have been in establishing your perfect order."

"I despise categories, Hinev." Ornenkai threw back, defensively. "I'm unjust?—ha! What kind of an accusation is that? Who says I am unjust? I am Ornenkai, and I live by one rule, and that is that I wish to survive as I am. If I am unjust, it is only a matter of opinion, and a minority opinion at that. I think I have done what had to be done. I don't regret a thing."

"Well, well. 'You despise'?" Hinev echoed calmly.

Ornenkai narrowed his eyes on Hinev in profound irritation. "Despise, dislike, disdain—what does a word mean? I use whatever term I can come up with to convey the point to you, and the degree of my sincerity and integrity, which you can't pick apart." Ornenkai returned.

"I see." Hinev said, shrugging. "Still... you have changed my friend."

"Have I?" Ornenkai demanded angrily.

"You never used to believe that each of us has more than one side to him." Hinev explained, in a perfectly calm manner. "And though that speaks well of you, you seem to have abandoned the few principles you still had when I knew you last."

"Such as?" Ornenkai persisted.

"You were a fair man, and a reasonable one, even if you tended to be judgmental. Now that you are no longer judgmental, you've lost all capacity of preserving justice."

"What do you know about me?" Ornenkai laughed. "I believe in order. Anyway, justice and injustice, partial justice, the common good—we'll never be able to conclusively define anything touching upon these issues. In practicality, justice can only be achieved under the law."

"Oh? Is that your opinion, or Marankeil's?"

"Mine," Ornenkai said firmly.

"Yet you once told me that the value is in the attempt to be just, in what we can learn, not in denying the possibility that there is always more to be understood on the subject."

"Perhaps I did." Ornenkai admitted. "But times change, and people change. You call me unjust, but it isn't easy to be just to everyone, when thousands of different groups oppose each other."

Hinev laughed.

"What's so funny?" Ornenkai demanded.

"You, my friend. You don't believe in anything anymore, do you?"

Ornenkai was silent a moment.

"Just get on with your cloning, old man, and well discuss ethics later."

Though the clone body had finally begun to near its late-life years, the body showed little signs of aging; a few white hairs had appeared at the temples several hundred years before, and the supple line and strength in the clone body had waned so gradually that it was hardly noticeable. But he had noticed. And the eyes—they would have to be corrected. The clone eyes had never been adequate, not entirely to his liking, anyway. The clone eyes were not quite as bright as his original ones had been and not the same color exactly, but, he admitted, at least they were human eyes!

Hinev looked up at the sound of the door opening. He watched the intruder enter his laboratory but said nothing.

"Well, Hinev, I have heard that Ornenkai is scheduled to receive his new clone body in a few days."

"Yes," Hinev answered evenly, but his visitor appeared certain that his reply had been confrontational.

"And were you going to deny my request? Need I remind you that if you refuse to comply, you will in effect put others at risk? If I must, I will find another scientist who can initiate a transferal, no matter how long it takes—perhaps then I might even reclaim the initial test subjects, hmmm? Perhaps I should use the body of Alessia Enassa Zadúmchov in the new transferal. We both know what she represents—why the serum worked so successfully upon her. Her body would be a valuable asset."

"You know the transfer is impossible once a subject has received the serum." Hinev's voice was calm.

"Are you willing to take the chance that I will never be capable of it? You achieved the metamorphosis many years ago, but technology moves on. Would it not pain you to hear my soul speaking through the body of one of your precious explorers? Fielikor Kiel—it was he whom I selected for the transferal long ago."

"An excellent choice, Marankeil, but I'm afraid the host body lacked enough ambition to match yours," Ornenkai interrupted, approaching from the other side of the laboratory where he had silently watched the exchange.

I will never let you do anything to Alessia, Ornenkai thought to himself in the depths of his mind that neither Marankeil nor Hinev could reach, watching Marankeil with a deliberately benign expression. Alessia—how long had it been since he dared to allow himself to think of her? Had she been the one he saw, the one on the steps of the Council building? He told himself that had only been his imagination.

"Elder Ornenkai—dear friend—I did not know you were here," Marankeil offered in a tone that mustered amusement effectively. "But do convince our colleague here that it is in his best interest to meet the demands of a Federation Councilor." Marankeil turned again to Hinev to regard him with keen cobalt eyes.

"A new clone for you already waits for the transferal, Elder Marankeil." Hinev said, ignoring Marankeil's impatience. "I didn't inform you of its creation because you didn't bother to enquire for further information on my progress." Hinev settled back into his work.

Marankeil watched the scientist for several moments, angered by his undeferential behavior. Then slowly Marankeil began to laugh, as though some simple truth had dawned on him. Ornenkai watched, confused, feeling uneasy. It was as though Marankeil had prodded Hinev's soul, and found a hidden weakness. Marankeil departed a moment later, his manner alarmingly triumphant.

"Meragh," Hinev cursed in what Ornenkai recognized as Mrawlitz as he tried to assemble his data on the monitors, making an odd gesture as he returned to his calculations.

As Ornenkai observed Hinev the remainder of that afternoon, he did begin to notice a slight change in the man since the last time they had worked together on Selesta—Hinev kept forgetting what he was doing, kept changing his opinions; he seemed to digress from reason to sentimentality rapidly, and voiced discursive thoughts aloud.

Hinev began mumbling about Tulor at one point, and didn't respond to his own name.

At that point the horror of what was happening to Hinev sunk in; Ornenkai wondered why he hadn't noticed Hinev's bizarre behavior before, but it occurred to him that the changes had been gradual, and that at times Hinev could still be as lucid as daylight; yet now it was clear to Ornenkai that in the years of Hinev's disappearance, the dreamer had seen too much.

Fynals Hinev had changed, and his mind was haunted by the minds he had invaded with a mindlink. The invaded minds had in turn become the invaders.

The sun had only begun to send magenta beams through the dark sky when Ornenkai rose for his morning walk in the public Arboretum, the arboretum museum. The city of Ariyalsynai was always busy, but within the Council dome, traffic and visitors did not usually make an appearance until long after sunrise.

Ornenkai turned around a corner to inspect a large jigfal tree whose branches were drooping when he heard a cry if surprise. He quickly looked to his right, where a young woman he had bumped into had fallen.

Her face and features were obscured by the darkness in the garden. She wore a plain uniform, but it was not yet bright enough to read the markings and insignia. Reflexively, Ornenkai reached out to his second mechanized unit, the back-up machine located within the Arboretum grounds, to make a telepathic link from his own mechanized unit to the woman's mind. To his surprise, he found himself unable to read the woman's thoughts.

He peered at her closely—no, his heart raced within his breast. Could it be?! He knew that face; he knew those eyes—

There was something different about them, though. They seemed far sadder and wiser than he remembered them, full of the memory of long years, yet they were still eyes that embraced the light, and goodness!

Yes, it was Alessia! His heart was racing again; he could hardly think clearly. She had already gotten up and walked several paces away. He moved silently towards her, trying hard to control himself from any overt motion towards her, suppressing the desire to run to her and pin her down, to touch her hair, her skin, her body, to declare his identity to her and watch her surprise. If he could only reach her before she left! She would see him as a man at last, not as the horrid dark, passionless creature hewn of metal, of insensate matter.

Selerael sensed his presence and looked back, meeting the eyes of the man who had found her, but the sight of his mystified face initiated a strong reaction in her. She gave a little gasp Ornenkai's senses enjoyed.

Until he realized this wasn't Alessia. As she stopped, staring as much at him as he stared at her, he began to doubt that he was right. This stranger wasn't Alessia, he told himself, but the eyes, the features, almost convinced him that he was wrong. Who then? He wondered. Who? Who else had those eyes? Whoever she was, the woman appeared shaken and in a great hurry to leave. She acted as though she had been trapped, as if she had been caught doing something wrong, something she should feel guilty about. But Ornenkai was not prepared to let her go yet. No—creator above, he must know!

"Just a minute," he said, catching up to her and grabbing her arm, but the delicious pleasure of the contact was dulled by his uncertainty. "Who are you? Don't I... know you?"

The woman nodded slightly, turning her face aside to keep him from looking at her.

Ornenkai, Selerael realized. This was Ornenkai! The computerized voice that had been with her so very long ago when she was a child, that had spoken to her on Earth and urged her to search for the singularity—the Enorian singularity. This was the man who had taken her from her mother Alessia, the creature who had been with her throughout her long journeys in Selesta, the computer that had known—or would know—her son Adam and her beloved friends on Earth, but not for many years. In the future.

This young man with ancient eyes, staring at her, almost angelic in his appearance, in his handsome features, was Ornenkai, the future Vice-Emperor of the Seynorynaelian Empire!

Why hadn't she sensed him nearby? She only knew that she had come to the Arboretum because it reminded her of the Seynorynaelian Forest in Selesta. Who would have thought he would also come here so early, just past sunrise? Didn't the great Elder have better things to do with his time than to stroll through the Arboretum?

"So are you going to tell me who you are?" he asked, taking her arm. She was struck by the odd thought that she had known Ornenkai her entire life long, and this was the first time he had ever touched her, the first time she had ever felt him as a humanoid being.

"No." She said quietly, her eye straying to his hand on her arm, then back to his face.

"No?" He looked at her—was this Alessia? Did she know who he was? Was there any way he could will her to answer him? If she were Alessia, there was nothing he could do to impel her. She was safe from him, horribly, inescapably safe from him. But if she wasn't Alessia, who could she be? No one else in all the world but Hinev and his explorers could keep their thoughts safe from the Seynorynaelian Elders, who possessed rudimentary telepathic powers even in their clone forms.

"I think I've seen you before." He said, a crease forming between his brows as he tried to remember where.

"No, you must be mistaken—" she protested, trying to move away. He felt the steel tension in her arm and looked at her harder; the tension went slack as he did. Did she know that her strength would betray her identity to him?

Only Hinev's explorers were so strong.

Suddenly, Ornenkai remembered her. "You're the woman who was there by the Council Building when that revolutionary force appeared a few years ago!" He stepped back and let go of her arm, waiting, watching her.

"Yes," the woman admitted. "That must be why you thought you knew me," she added.

Her voice was soft, almost a whisper, but it didn't matter to Ornenkai. Now he was certain that he knew the young woman, that he had heard that voice before. And the look in her eyes was one of recognition, as though she too had seen him before. Was this Alessia, changed by time? Several moments passed as they stood their ground without speaking, and the sun began to climb above the horizon of Ariyalsynai's most distant buildings.

"Elder Ornenkai—message from council." Ornenkai's personal communicator interrupted. "The Selesta has sent a message from just outside our solar system. She will be arriving today."

"Message received," Ornenkai acknowledged, but his sudden excitement was cut short as he looked over at the young woman. Her bright, expressive eyes had suddenly widened, paralyzing him. As she looked at him, he began to picture the spaceship Selesta—but why? Why was he associating her face with Selesta?

The Selesta and Alessia were both far away from this place.

Selerael saw her chance to move away when another call interrupted them, and Ornenkai turned aside to examine the holo-message that had been sent to him.

"Tell them I'll come," Ornenkai said as the message ended, not bothering to mask the irritation in his voice.

He turned around quickly—where was she? The messages must have betrayed his identity to the young woman—yes, Alessia would have run from Elder Ornenkai! He cursed and threw the communicator to the ground, crushing it under his heel. The damned thing had given her the chance to escape, and she had fled, as always.

At long last, Selesta had returned. The ship was docked now in the small astroport just south of Ariyalsynai.

Ornenkai immediately altered his plans for the season, as did every other scientist and politician across the planet Seynorynael; many others were to arrive in Ariyalsynai in the coming tendays from other planets across the Federation, yet the crew of Selesta were inexplicably confined to their lounge in the astroport shortly after their arrival. At least, that was the common report being circulated around the elite circles of the city.

Ornenkai left the Council meeting to discuss the return of Hinev's explorers earlier than expected. Not even Marankeil guessed that Ornenkai was furious at the other Elders as he departed, furious at Marankeil most of all; Ornenkai was angry that in the course of the discussion, Marankeil had made Ornenkai feel more a sinecure than the second Elder of Seynorynael's Council, for all the worth Ornenkai's voice had been given in the debates.

The Council had only granted clearance to the Selesta's leader Kiel to leave the ship, in order to contain the potentially harmful specimens on board and the returning explorers who had been exposed to unknown alien environments. And though Ornenkai argued that the returning explorers deserved at the least a hero's welcome from the city, Marankeil kept the explorers isolated in the small astroport outside Ariyalsynai; Ornenkai was under no illusions as to the real reason for this—Marankeil simply didn't want them to have the chance to undermine his authority and hadn't yet figured out how to keep them suitably under control once they left their temporary quarters.

Several days later, Gerryls sent the explorers' findings and ship log to the Federation Council members, and Marankeil called another meeting to deal with the ambassadors that had accompanied Selesta's crew, humanoids from the planet Feiar. Ornenkai was absent from the meeting, and only later learned that Kiel had been summoned to attend.

A strange attack of conscience had struck Ornenkai in the intervening days.

Ornenkai was beginning to dread a confrontation with Kiel and the others, as though he felt guilty for some unspecified crime Hinev's explorers might level against him; yes, there was no doubt that they would see that Ornenkai had grown comfortable with the power he had achieved, the control he now had over the fate of the Federation—yet a part of Ornenkai desperately wished to meet the explorers again. That part of him harbored an instinctive urge to help them in whatever they wished to do now, an urge that the rest of Ornenkai, that Ornenkai's reasoning intellect, couldn't seem to fathom.

Several tendays passed, and Ornenkai finally located Hinev, having looked for the scientist out of a casual interest in discovering the man's reaction to the return of Hinev's explorers. Hinev was, in the end, not difficult to find. Having disappeared from his laboratory against orders, the scientist had been confined to a holding cell in southern Ariyalsynai, as far from the Selesta as possible. Hinev had not agreed to abstain from contacting the explorer team, but Marankeil must have worked out an arrangement to contain and hold the scientist, and had done so, somehow; Ornenkai doubted Marankeil had been able to do so without some kind of threat. Hinev would not have allowed himself to be restricted from the explorers' company otherwise.

However, Ornenkai soon discovered how easy it must have been for Marankeil to confine Hinev. Ornenkai claimed to want to see Hinev to ask his opinion about all of the fuss concerning the revitalized First Race Theory that was all the talk in the scientific circles of Ariyalsynai. But when Ornenkai entered Hinev's cell, Fynals Hinev didn't appear to recognize Ornenkai at first. For a time, Hinev seemed to have forgotten who he was. Ornenkai gave up trying to communicate after a while and returned the following day.

On Ornenkai's second visit, Hinev was more or less his old self and seemed interested to hear about the talk circulating in the scientific circles of Ariyalsynai about his revitalized First Race Theory. It seemed that Hinev's explorers had brought the evidence that gave the Council reason to believe that the ancient Seynorynaelian civilization had seeded the galaxies with humanoid populations—for they would not believe that the first race was the Enorians.

"Don't you want to visit Alessia, and the returning explorers?" Ornenkai asked Hinev with a ghost of a laugh, looking around at the confining walls of the holding cell; as Ornenkai spoke, he realized he was communicating a communal wish they both shared. Hinev had spoken so wistfully of his memories of the launch and the days that Alessia had been his assistant that Ornenkai felt sure he would be willing to trade all forbidden future contact to negotiate one meeting with his adoptive daughter, but would he be able to meet her?

Ornenkai realized that the Council could publicize a meeting between Alessia and Hinev for the entertainment of the people, announcing the participants as descendants of the mission creators, and Marankeil would no longer need to fear the reunion, because he could monitor the interchange and keep Hinev from them in the future by his own word in exchange for the opportunity. Marankeil would certainly also profit as the Elder responsible for such a clever reunion.

Ornenkai was so caught up in his idea, so convinced that it would come about, that Hinev's response shocked him.

"No, I don't want to see them," Hinev said, turning away.

Ornenkai made no attempt to hide his surprise or disappointment.

If Hinev had met Alessia, Ornenkai would have been present—he would have at last been able to meet Alessia as a humanoid being. The meeting might be the only excuse for Alessia to leave Selesta and the explorer's temporary quarters in the Ariyalsynai astroport before Marankeil carried the plan Ornenkai expected him to propose soon—that Hinev's explorers speedily set out once more on their next mission.

"You don't mean that," Ornenkai protested.

Hinev turned bleary eyes to him. "I don't want her to see me like this," Hinev explained, waving his hand dismissively. "I know what is happening to me, Ornenkai," he added, meeting the Elder's gaze. Ornenkai caught it with a shiver. He knew exactly what Hinev meant by that; Hinev apparently knew and accepted the fact that he was changing with alien memories into a creature no longer himself. "I don't want her or the others to fear the future, to wonder if perhaps such a thing could happen to them." Hinev added, in a voice that was but a bare echo of the dynamic speech he had once possessed.

Ornenkai regarded him with a sensation of pity. Years of isolation from other beings like him, altered by the serum, had begun to destroy him. The line between Hinev's own entity and the memories of others had clearly been blurred in the man's mind. And even when he knew himself, there were moments in which Hinev apparently could not distinguish between the present and the past.

When Ornenkai discovered that he could do nothing to change Hinev's mind, however, he left the man in his holding cell, left him to himself, and did not return.

After nearly half a year since Selesta's return, Ornenkai heard that three of Hinev's explorers, Kiel, Gerryls, and Kellar, would be attending a meeting at the Council building in Ariyalsynai. Ornenkai received the news too late to arrange to be present; Ornenkai was furious at himself for missing the meeting, but for once, he didn't blame the other Elders that he hadn't been informed of the meeting in time. Ornenkai was often the last to hear news from the Council, but his detachment from the workings of the Council was entirely self-imposed, self-imposed because Ornenkai chose to do as he pleased more and more and to estrange himself from the Council's intrigues and gossip.

Most of the Federation Council and Seynorynaelian Council held the mysterious Ornenkai in awe and missed his absence, for he and Marankeil were the oldest Elders and had been the closest of friends in their early days, and the younger representatives regarded Elder Ornenkai as something of an enigma, a relic from a bygone aeon, a wise, discriminating, and discerning man who was Marankeil's closest ally. Ornenkai never openly opposed Marankeil, and even when Ornenkai felt subtly slighted by Marankeil, Ornenkai kept up his usual farce of reticence and supreme impassivity.

People often said that Ornenkai's silence marked the quiet nobility of his nature; Ornenkai decided that this reputation was better than being disrespected and never sought to correct his peers on the matter of his character.

If anything, Ornenkai felt fortunate that the slights made against him by Marankeil were far too subtle in nature for anyone else to catch, anyone who didn't know Marankeil as well as he did. The other Elders revered Ornenkai nearly as much as Marankeil, who often relied upon his friend for a differing opinion when the other Elders were too afraid to suggest any. And on the recent proposal for a new explorer mission, the two had seemed to be entirely in agreement.

Had Marankeil and Ornenkai ever argued or disagreed openly?

How close the two were was a matter often debated; in truth, Ornenkai himself often wondered about their relationship. It was true that he had often privately disagreed with Marankeil's decisions, but he could never actively oppose him. Their friendship did, as Marankeil had once said, extend beyond the bounds of time, and it was so solidly rooted in the passing ages that Ornenkai felt certain that under no circumstances would he ever be able to actively betray Ilikan Marankeil.

Moreover, despite Ornenkai's misgivings on occasion, in fact perhaps because of them, it was clear to all of the Council that Marankeil trusted Ornenkai implicitly, far more than Marankeil trusted any of the other Elders. They did not know that Ornenkai was in fact the only being that Marankeil trusted. For Marankeil knew Ornenkai better than anyone. Marankeil often seemed able to discern Ornenkai's thoughts almost before Ornenkai had formed them himself, and Marankeil also knew exactly how to manipulate Ornenkai to his own advantage.

At the same time, Ornenkai knew his friend almost as well.

On the afternoon of the Council's meeting with the explorers, Ornenkai was returning to record his memories into the permanent mechanized unit in the Main Terminus, when he suddenly spied Kiel leaving the Council Building, escorted by guards. Ornenkai hadn't arranged to meet with him; but he was pleased that he had come across Lieutenant Kiel by chance.

Ornenkai took several steps towards Kiel as the explorer waited for the transport to collect him and shuttle him back to their temporary quarters; Kiel's gaze passed over Ornenkai as Ornenkai approached, but the leader of Hinev's explorers showed no outward sign of recognizing Ornenkai in his present clone form. Nearby, a strange assembly of alien delegates had just arrived on the planet and were being escorted into the Council Building; they turned and stared at Ornenkai. Kiel followed their gaze and gave the Elder an uncertain look. After a moment, Ornenkai felt a shadow pass over his mind.

Ornenkai relinquished nothing to the presence—a clone Elder was not easily interrogated, especially so close to the Main Terminus. That was how Kiel discovered Ornenkai's identity—only the mechanized Elders could resist the telepathic powers of Hinev's explorers, and Marankeil and the others had been present at the recent Council meeting.

"Elder Ornenkai?!" Kiel exclaimed as Ornenkai narrowed the distance between them to but a few paces away. "I didn't recognize you." Kiel laughed; the guards flanking him stepped away in deference to Ornenkai.

"I should imagine not." Ornenkai agreed.

"I must say I was surprised when we returned and Marankeil was presented to me as a human clone. You know, I half expected you'd be at the meeting today."

The two fell to talking; Kiel asked several questions, some about why Hinev's explorers had been kept on board Selesta, and what the new proposed explorer mission was really about.

Ornenkai looked away, reluctant to answer. He had finally approved of Marankeil's proposed new explorer mission, a venture outside the Great Cluster Galaxy into several other galaxies, one of them the small group that he remembered from an ancient illustration they had found in the Enorian Havens; at the same time, Ornenkai wished for nothing more than Hinev's explorers to remain on Seynorynael for a significant length of time before the new mission. Only Marankeil would never allow it.

Marankeil still feared Hinev's explorers.

"You sense it, too, don't you, Ornenkai?" Kiel asked at length.

"What?"

"That for some reason Marankeil wants to keep us—to keep Selesta away from Seynorynael, away from the Federation." Kiel said, with a steady gaze that met Ornenkai's eyes.

Ornenkai nodded. "Yes," he replied after a moment. "Yes, you know that he does. But consider his reasons," Ornenkai added. "Not only can you do his work for him by augmenting Seynorynaelian power and expanding our sphere of influence across new territories, but he will no longer need to fear that you will use your abilities to usurp power on our world. I believe Marankeil imagines he is acting to preserve peace and maintain order."

Kiel laughed hard; Ornenkai kept silent, despite a hidden inclination to laugh along with Kiel. Kiel quieted, digesting the information; Ornenkai's opinion reinforced what he had long believed. "I hear that the Federation actually disapproved of Marankeil's suggestions." Kiel said after a moment. "They thought visiting that small galaxy group so far away from The Great Cluster will be a waste of time and resources."

"Yes, they didn't approve right away." Ornenkai shrugged. "But you will find none so bold as to disagree—well, not strongly enough to permanently object against the idea."

"No." Kiel agreed. "I know. In fact, they've just approved the mission."

"So then, when does Selesta leave?" Ornenkai ventured, keeping his voice steady.

"As soon as the technicians finish stowing supplies on board." Kiel replied with a mild sigh. "Ornenkai, is anything wrong?" Kiel enquired after a moment.

Ornenkai stood still. He had suddenly noticed how loud the traffic of transports sounded high above them, in the upper skies of the dome.

"No." Ornenkai said, looking to Kiel. "So tell me what was discussed in the meeting?" he added, brightening.

As Kiel went into the particulars of the meeting, Ornenkai listened absently.

All Ornenkai could think about was that Selesta was leaving, leaving soon. And Ornenkai wouldn't be able to meet with Hinev's explorers, whom he had not seen since the long gone days of The Firien Project. Why had Marankeil deliberately kept them away from Ornenkai? Ornenkai wondered.

Could it be that Marankeil was jealous of Ornenkai's familiarity with the explorers, that he feared that Ornenkai might be sympathetic to them? Wasn't this a reasonable fear, though, in light of Ornenkai's involvement in The Firien Project so long ago? And could it be that Ornenkai had returned to his old feelings from that era of time?

Ornenkai rejected that thought. At the same time, he considered, what if Marankeil should ever discover Ornenkai's feelings for Alessia Zadúmchov? Or did Marankeil suspect them already?

To what ends those feelings might have prompted his own actions, Ornenkai would never know. Hinev's explorers were leaving Seynorynael once more, perhaps never to return.

Yet Ornenkai suppressed a strong desire to help them, a growing idea that he would try to turn over the Council's decision. He allowed the idea to take form and pondered it several moments with enthusiasm.

Then, after a time, Ornenkai was able to master himself once more; he felt a disappointing sensation while admitting to himself that this was what he had known he would do all along, despite the momentary, idealistic and noble self-delusion he had just indulged in. Ornenkai grappled with a sense of self-disgust at his own cowardice and watched Kiel, half-regretting his decision to ignore the nascent thought of rebellion against the council; yet he was also relieved that the rebellion had been safely aborted before it matured to fruition and life.

Ornenkai simply found it impossible to betray Marankeil. Something, he knew not what exactly, kept him from the very thought of betraying Marankeil. However, at the same time, Ornenkai really was torn in his loyalties, torn in a way that he himself could little understand.

Kiel, Gerryls, and the others from Firien commanded a portion of those mixed loyalties, yet it was Alessia who complicated them most significantly.

Alessia...

At the very thought of her, Ornenkai's unsettled conscience could find no peace. What was this love he harbored for Alessia, this meaningless passion that should have died long ago? he asked himself. What was this feeling in his breast that should be insignificant, this passion of a man who should care more for the power and conquest he had had achieved and who should now be looking forward towards a new dream rather than spiraling down a destructive path in a vain desire for an unattainable fantasy?

But was that all she was to him?

Ornenkai tried his best to forget Hinev's explorers after that day; for if he had admitted it to himself, he no longer even knew which side he was on apart from his own.

Almost two tendays later, Selesta was launched again, though all but three of her crew had been barred from leaving the ship the entire time it had been grounded.

Ornenkai felt mixed emotions as he watched the launch, aware that he was in part responsible for preventing the reunion he had long anticipated between Alessia and himself. His own torn conscience had asked him to make a stand to prevent the explorers' departure, but only now that it was too late did he really begin to regret his indecision.

Alessia—separated from her all of these years—now to be separated for many, many more—he should have abandoned his thoughts of her, he told himself. It was the only thing to do to preserve his heart.

He had thought that was what he would do, the only thing he could do, and that he would recover from losing her. He had planned to sever himself from all future thoughts of her, and had even convinced himself that Selesta's departure would make this relatively easy.

Only when the ship had gone did he understand that he had been fooling himself.

When the madness of the take-off celebrations died, Ornenkai looked about at the lovely white city of Ariyalsynai with its wide avenues and glittering ornate buildings, its gardens, fountains, forums, and he felt as though he had been left adrift in a dream, because everything he surveyed seemed to him suddenly as meaningless as the substance of a fantasy.

Ornenkai returned to the Arboretum, the arboretum museum, that had once given him such pleasure to haunt, and no longer felt any satisfaction ensconced there as he once had; it seemed that everywhere he went, there was a great emptiness around him, that moved always with him, impenetrable. The trees were horribly silent. The world was horribly spiritless. And he felt horribly alone, even more so when he returned to the Elders' Building, when he attended parties for several prominent delegates in the coming tendays, when he was surrounded by the hordes of humanity who as always passed through his life like shadows.

The world was nothing without the source of his love. What else mattered but his love for Alessia? he demanded of himself, torturing himself for his cowardice and blindness. What would she say if she knew him for the creature he had become? He hadn't deserved to meet her again, he told himself. Perhaps that was why he had submitted to Marankeil's decision. Ornenkai knew that in Alessia's eyes, he remained more than a monster, no matter what outward form he might have taken.

And for the first time, he knew also that his love had grown beyond his ability to contain it. Ornenkai defied the idea that great, all-consuming love was doomed to exhaust itself; to his mind, real, deep love could never die but turned into ardent devotion, whose inexhaustible power fueled such love indefinitely. Ornenkai recognized that Alessia was no longer merely an obsession to him. From that day onward, from the day of Selesta's second departure, she was the constant force within him, compelling him, watching over his actions—she became his conscience. The thought of her reaction to whatever he might do guided him through his movements—he imagined her approval and criticism over all he did and in this way found peace in his actions.

Though the odds of Selesta surviving the unknown were slim, Ornenkai found he could not lose all hope that her crew would return; to lose all hope would have been the end of him. For there was one hope that filled him and kept him alive. He knew that when Selesta returned again, when Alessia returned again, he would make sure that he never left her side, no matter what it took, no matter what he had to sacrifice to make it possible, he would stay with her, yes—by any means necessary.

Chapter Twelve

Concerning the foundation of any empire, a million words might be said once the founding is a fait accompli, and yet the event that directly caused such a founding and even the very founding itself still retain on their side the stultifying powers of mystery and awe, whose influence even the greatest Seynorynaelian critics could not entirely discount.

The Seynorynaelian Empire, founded in 19,791 L.I.A (years since the city of Ariyal-synai's founding) was a matter officially settled by the Seynorynaelian and Federation Councils, who, after a very brief meeting, handed over permanent authoritative control to Elder Marankeil, now the Emperor, and to his Vice-Emperor Ornenkai, while space vessels flared and fell hard against the very city dome of Ariyalsynai from the skies far above.

The Federation Council relinquished power to Marankeil in the heat of an emergency situation, a situation created by a renegade Federation army and fleet under the command of General Capriniar. Capriniar's renegade army was leading a simultaneous assault against the planet Seynorynael itself and against several local Federation worlds and colonies.

Even as a clone, Marankeil was no soldier, yet he was a brilliant tactician, and after generations of solidifying and strengthening the power of the Martial Force that he had created, he commanded the absolute loyalty of the Seynorynaelian and Federation legions, aboard space battleships, in the grounded peace-keeping armies, among even the common pilots.

The rebellious fleet of the disgruntled General Capriniar was defeated in the course of a single Seynorynaelian day; however, to prevent future attacks and to safeguard the planet and Federation from the possibility of free Federation merchants legally acquiring anti-matter weaponry and selling it to the highest bidder, the Council elected not to remove the special powers it had bestowed upon one of its own, Elder Marankeil, in their eyes the oldest and wisest creature in all of the Federation. The decision of the combined Councils, which had to be unanimous, waited for several hours upon the arrival of Elder Ornenkai, who had been difficult to locate and in the end had to be expeditiously shuttled to the Council Building.

Ornenkai listened quietly as the matter of the coup was relayed to him in all haste; then, as all eyes fell upon him, he cast the final, deciding vote in favor of the emergency action—and with that vote, Marankeil became the Emperor.

Thus the glorious reign of the Seynorynaelian Empire had begun, and ever after the date was marked by L. I. I. (years since the founding of the Empire).

In the coming years, historians remarked upon the efforts of the Vice-Emperor Ornenkai to raise the standards of living in the most remote imperial colonies, of his many disappearances to off-worlds and of his magnanimity; the Emperor Marankeil himself could not of course be expected to leave the safety of the planet Seynorynael and its newly established security rings, or the security of his own personal praetorian guard.

As always, Marankeil kept himself from the public, as though conscious of the fact that distance was a mysterious veil that could be manipulated in his favor, to hide any flaws and incite perpetual curiosity and reverence.

For a time, he was generally considered a wise, just, and virtuous Emperor, an Emperor concerned with the glory of the Empire and the well-being of its citizens.

Returning from his off-world efforts, Ornenkai once again fell into the political intrigues of Ariyalsynai and soon became confessor to Marankeil once more, as he had been in the early days of their friendship. Because of this, on a whim, Marankeil refused to let Ornenkai leave the Imperial Palace for many long years.

Soon Ornenkai began to realize the futility of his own humanitarian efforts across the new Empire; for Marankeil cared only to control everything and everyone and overturned on a mere whim societies and laws Ornenkai had established; after a millennium of imperial rule, Marankeil espoused a belief that people couldn't rule themselves properly, that before the Empire, they had made bad choices for their lives, choices now magnanimously made for them; and the Empire citizens themselves believed that there would be disorder, chaos, and internal war without the Emperor who had given them unity and order.

Ornenkai kept silent throughout it all, and survived from one day to the next.

The officer sat down heavily in a chair in front of the musicians playing alorcheli music in the Seynorynaelian section of the lounge and relaxation center adjacent to the Imperial Science Building. He listened to the soft tones of the alien music and found it calming.

"Hello, friend, have you returned from the Ephoran front line?" A loud voice interrupted him, and a middle-aged Seynorynaelian man invited himself to sit down next to the officer.

"You're a Captain, I see," the man nodded knowingly, indicating the insignia on the officer's left breastplate, a swirling design surrounding the engraved letters of the officer's name. "Captain Lethar-wúd." He read the words slowly and smiled. The Captain gave a slight nod and then turned away.

"So, you've returned from the Ephor territory?" The stranger persisted. "Any word on how much longer the latest war will last?"

The Captain could see that the man was not going to leave him alone until he got an answer, and set down his drink.

"The Ephors are still resisting. I can't say how long it will take the Empire to quell their rebellion, but they do appear to be weakening."

"Yes. I heard that the Mirelion returned this morning from the Ephor system—from galaxy group two beyond the Great Cluster—with news of an impending victory. Your ship?"

"Yes. You know, the Ephors would never have attempted to defy the Empire if we weren't already at war. They only took advantage of our vulnerability—we can't fight the Lhrekvidamyl, Kaelri, and the Ephors at the same time, and Emperor Marankeil refuses to dispatch the Imperial Fleet with the threat of revolutionary groups appearing in Arialsynai."

"There has been much talk of them while your fleet was away." The stranger admitted. "The city is alive with rumors that there are revolutionaries who would change the past and destroy Seynorynael if they could—and with the centipede star gates so carefully monitored, it seems that some of them have even attempted the dangerous rotating black hole gates to reach a point in the past before Selesta existed and the technology of the ancients was discovered."

The Captain appeared shocked, and then composed himself. "Obviously the revolutionaries failed," he said at last.

"Yes—it is said that they might have been lost in time, but others think it more likely that they perished in the black holes. They did not know how to withstand the forces within the event horizon. But it seems that the Ephors have begun to pose a stronger threat to the Empire. I have heard that the Ephors are again a very strong and violent people. Surely they have made a difficult enemy, as they once did in ancient history before their planet's cessation to the Empire," the stranger observed.

"Hmmm," Captain Lethar-wúd nodded. "A cruel, monstrous race, who treated their own colonies far worse back in ancient days than the Empire ever treated them. If you ask me, the Empire would be better off without the Ephors. We can never trust the Ephor worlds again, especially if they were to gain their independence. Besides—they aren't true humanoids. They aren't a brother race."

But they are living beings. The stranger looked at the Captain, his eyes narrowed. "You seem to believe in the First Race Theory," he commented.

Lethar-wúd turned around in surprise, quick to respond, but the older man looked harmless. "I suppose I still do. It isn't a crime—yet," the Captain shrugged.

"But Emperor Marankeil doesn't support the theory any more. I'm surprised that you would disagree—seeing that by maintaining your own opinion, you might be putting your position in jeopardy."

"Perhaps," the Captain nodded and took a sip of his drink. He was not certain what the stranger's motives were, but he was certain that the man would not get far with any threats.

"Rumor has it that the last man who claimed to be Hinev changed his mind about the First Race Theory." The stranger said. "He knew he was wrong when they found our ancient ancestors—the creatures frozen in the glaciers of the north—"

"I believe you are mistaken." The Captain argued. "The Hinev pretender only claimed that neither the Seynorynaelians nor any other race was the "first race", even though we might be the ancient race's closest descendants. As for our primitive ancestors, they could very well have been used as genetic material for the advanced race that came to our world. And pretender or not, the man made a lot of sense in my opinion. Now, if you don't mind telling me, I'd like to know the reason for this little game of yours."

"Don't worry, I didn't set out to ruin you." Said the stranger.

"Glad to hear it."

"It disturbs me to see our people forgetting the ties of friendship between the ancient Federation planets." The stranger went on.

"Friendship is overrated."

"I disagree." The stranger shook his head. "And I also believe that they are our brothers, but our people can't live with that idea and still subjugate others—so they must reject the teachings of the past, and the First Race Theory as well."

"You aren't a scientist, are you?" the Captain mused, contemplating the strange man's words. As he spoke, Lethar-wúd had begun to see a depth in the man he had first perceived as a simpleton.

"What—me, a scientist?" the stranger echoed. "Let's say that I am a historian, and that the lore of the ancients interests me."

"Then I would call you a friend. The Mirelion leaves in three days, but until then, friend, I would greatly value hearing a historian's stories, stories an officer doesn't often get to hear. Perhaps they might be useful."

"Then, I would be delighted."

"Would you join me for a drink tomorrow?" The Captain asked, rising in his chair.

"You have to report in?" The stranger asked, and Lethar-wúd nodded. "Very well, then, tomorrow—we'll meet here again, if that's all right," he suggested.

"As long as you buy me a drink." Lethar-wúd laughed, and the historian watched him leave.

A few minutes later, the man left the lounge.

I can't fight much longer, he thought to himself. What can one man do to fight the majority? What can one man do to fight the reality and the truth an entire world has decided to create?

And the more he struggled to fight against tyranny, the more he investigated and acted in the name of the common good, the more he strangled his own identity. Yes, he knew, he was slowly killing himself.

As he walked down the pedestrian thoroughfare to a neighboring building, he turned the corner and into a shadowed area. A brief spark of light enveloped him, dispelling the illusion that had surrounded his features.

He turned back into the street and saw his dark, no longer very exotic features mutely reflected in a silver panel of the cosmopolitan city Arialsynai; this image, unchanged for thousands of years, haunted him, while he struggled to remember what the being he had been had thought on that day so long ago when the serum froze his body in time.

Who was this man staring back at him?

He quickly shifted the reflected image to another; he took on the form of a stranger, satisfied that this would keep Jerekkil and Undina from watching him.

"What's going on?" A voice interrupted the maintenance crew and android workers who were busy making final checks on the space cruiser in a large holding bay of Arialsynai's ninth astroport. The leader looked up and cast a glance at the Martial Force guards on duty, who stood before the disembarkation ramp to ensure that the ship's passengers were detained on board until departure. Then he looked at the stranger who had spoken, a Seynorynaelian hybrid man with piercing violet eyes.

"This area is off limits—"

"Why are those people on board that ship not allowed to leave? They aren't political prisoners." The stranger's resonant voice was so authoritative that the technician almost answered him.

"The Emperor wants—wait a minute, how did you know that there were people on board? This is a cargo ship," the man blinked.

"Where is the ship going?" The man asked, but the technician bit his lower lip and didn't answer. The stranger sighed.

Too easy... Nepheria, is it?

"So, why is Marankeil sending these people to Nepheria?" The stranger asked, and the man's mouth dropped open.

But the technician didn't know.

Hinev shrugged and left the man to his work, and decided to approach the guards instead.

"Step back, sir," one of the guards warned, but Hinev wasn't interested in them, and he didn't need to get very close.

As Hinev pulled his thoughts from the nearest guard's mind, he shuddered, genuinely affected by the knowledge he had gained.

Marankeil had grown tired of watching the proto-telepaths, possibly because he had been convinced that a would-be assassin might hide among them. Now he had decided to send them into exile—to keep them from acting in any way in protest against the Empire. One transport had already been sent to Goeur. Marankeil had given the last remnant of the proto-telepath colonies a choice—those who did not seem to be of any threat could either leave the planet immediately or face prison and a possible execution.

Those lucky enough to be given a choice had gone to Goeur until the quota of new colonists had been met. The less fortunate would be sent to Nepheria, with a brief stop on Tarcricor to undergo the genetic alteration that would allow them to withstand the aquatic environment and join the thriving colony there. Marankeil had no fear of them, but they would prove useful in stimulating the productivity of the sea mining on Nepheria.

As Hinev watched the technicians, despair clouded his reason. He could do nothing for the people on board without causing them harm, but they were his people, descendants of the Firien settlement where he had once lived, where he had been born. Deep in his heart, he wanted to scream, to vent his frustration, but his mind curtailed even the slightest inclination to vehement behavior.

In order to feel, he submerged his thoughts into his past, and found the past of many others, imprinted into his memory. As he pulled away, he felt the memories tempting him to forget himself, for the life of Fynals Hinev had never been easy. Hinev wondered if the day would come when his own conscious would be subverted by the others, but for now he only found his thoughts slightly muddled when he dipped into the pool of recollections.

The alien man, nerves on edge and attuned to every sound and sight around him, hurried right past her in the corridor without even seeing her. She crouched there by the cold stretch of silver wall, her breathing strained, but he wouldn't have heard her had she shouted or seen her if she had jumped out in front of him. She was invisible to him because her mind had sent him a suggestion that nothing was there; she was invisible to everything but the security recorders, and she knew how to take care of them with a current of electromagnetic waves.

This particular unfinished section of the new Imperial Palace was empty but for the occasional Martial Force sentry patrolling the dim corridors, but they only nodded to the alien man and continued down the corridor.

Hurbef was, for all intents and purposes, a guard himself.

Hurbef had assaulted one of the guards on the perimeter of Arialsynai and stolen his purple and green habiliments. Word of the single guard's disappearance was not likely to reach the newly constructed Imperial Palace for a while, with all that was going on, especially as Hurbef masqueraded in his stead. Hurbef and his comrades had picked the perfect moment to strike, and had perhaps as much as two days to complete their mission.

The guards did not seem to find it unusual that Hurbef kept his helmet on, with the visor down to conceal his identity; Hurbef's guard had been an alien himself, and spoke through a translation unit. In truth, it was next to impossible to gain access to the Empire Council Building and Imperial Palace through the main entrance without proper identification, but Hurbef hadn't risked it. He had bypassed the outer perimeter of the Palace and entered the building through an underground water pipe.

Hurbef was not alone, either. His leader, Marek, and the rest of their revolutionary team had been monitoring the cycling schedule carefully for a week in order to gain access to the building before the water was redirected through the pipe Hurbef had taken into the Palace.

Hurbef had cut a hole through the pipe where it intersected the atmospheric filtration system and temporarily resealed the pipe to keep from attracting any attention. From there, he had squeezed his way through the atmospheric system and into the interior of the building, where he found a utilities station to clean up and change into the uniform in his sack.

Hurbef was not a true humanoid, but a Yular native. He knew he could survive an hour or so if directly exposed to the Seynorynaelian atmosphere, if he were caught and exposed to that atmosphere, but after a while harmful nitrogen bubbles would begin to form in his bloodstream.

Hurbef went from one level to another, unaware of his shadow companion. His purpose was highly dangerous, highly risky, yet he knew that he had to gather as much information about the council itself, future council meetings, and most importantly, where the Main Terminus might be found—all without attracting the attention of any of the Elders in Marankeil's Advisory Council. If Hurbef were discovered and his mind interrogated, the Yular revolution would fail.

When Hurbef stepped from the elevation device on one of the last floors, he met the wary gazes of two Martial Force officers and knew he had found the level where the mind memory of Marankeil was stored, in the Main Terminus which was now under the Imperial Palace.

Now he could return with the news, so that the others could join him in the assault on the Emperor.

Without speaking, Hurbef shrugged, feigning that he had mistakenly come to the wrong floor, and pressed the automatic ascent button for the ground level. He only hoped the guards did not find it suspicious that he had not spoken the command aloud.

But there were no guards waiting to meet him on the ground floor. Hurbef sighed inwardly and prepared himself to pass the sentries who guarded passage in and out of the building.

"Step forward for identification." One of the guards told a woman entering the guards' gate of the Imperial Palace to lean forward into the eye-scanning device. After doing so, she displayed her identification card, in case she had somehow been cloned—only authorized personnel could pass both tests and know the code given every day for entry on the following one.

Leaving should have been far easier than gaining entry. But as Hurbef walked past the guards, one of them stopped him.

"Hey, friend, you forgot your salute," he laughed, but as Hurbef hesitated, the guard grew suspicious. "Wait a minute—submit identification card, please." He said, and Hurbef almost panicked. Now he had to accept that his mission and the Yular cause was over.

He took a deep breath, conscious of the taste of precious air.

Then slowly, he began to reach into his pocket for the laser beam gun he had taken with the clothes, when suddenly, the guard turned around, as though he had forgotten Hurbef's existence.

Hurbef stared in shock and stood still several moments longer.

Meanwhile, the woman entered the building, and the guards returned to their on-duty stance, completely ignoring Hurbef. Hurbef moved down the broad, blue stone inlaid white steps of the Imperial Palace, letting his foot fall as loudly as possible, as though testing his luck, but the guards took no further notice of him.

Was this a miracle?!

Hurbef walked across the empty courtyard, through the tranquillity of the guarded Imperial Forum and into the diplomats' access area, then turned the corner of the Arboretum, and headed past the partitioned access of the Elder's Forum. With this action, he passed into the unrestricted areas of Arialsynai, where both pedestrian, transport, and overhead shuttle traffic resumed and the general noise level rose substantially; he passed through the milling, noisome crowds of pedestrians catching transports and changing from one moving pathway to another, then found a quiet spot behind the small, nearest public arboretum and waited for Marek to find him. Suddenly a woman's voice interrupted him.

"Drop your weapon," she said.

Hurbef turned around in mute surprise. He was an elite soldier of Yular. How could he have made a mistake in determining that he had not been followed by any of the Imperial guards?

"Who... who are you?" He asked in accented Seynorynaelian.

"My name is Selerael," the woman answered in Yular, her face hidden by a helmet as she regarded the weapon at his side. Suddenly, the gun raised itself into mid-air, and floated over to the strange woman's outstretched hand.

Hurbef blinked in surprise. Marek was not going to believe him when he explained what happened to the gun.

The woman stayed by him until the others arrived at the rendezvous spot, attired as Seynorynaelian guards.

"Ah, Hurbef, how is the security—" Marek's voice broke off as he fully rounded the corner of the contained arboretum and noticed Hurbef's previously hidden companion. "Who are you?" he asked suspiciously, but at the same time his voice was demanding.

"All I can tell you is that her name is Selerael—she won't say why she followed me," Hurbef spoke in Yular.

"Stop, Iganoghchi," Marek warned, noticing the subtle movement of the soldier behind and to the right of him. He knew that the young woman proposed rushing the stranger through her body movement, but Marek shook his head. "We'll deal with her another way. Do you think she would have left Hurbef alive or let him speak to us if she didn't intend to treat with us? We would have had no way of knowing that she was even here before we arrived. She could have done anything—even called the real city guards."

Selerael regarded Marek several moments, struck by the man's insight and intelligence. Because the Yular had lived in primitive hillside dwellings they had been regarded as evolutionary inferiors by the Empire since their discovery thirty-one years ago. But they had merely been a young civilization, with little time to develop their unknown potential. And they were not necessarily, to her mind, inferior beings.

"What do you intend with us, stranger?" Marek asked boldly. She sensed that he and his people were proud and noble despite the terrible way that they had been treated by the Empire; she knew now more than ever that she had to stop them.

"I can't let you carry out your mission," Selerael answered as directly as Marek had asked. Marek looked about briefly to ensure that there was no one listening to this odd meeting.

"What reason would you have to interfere?" he asked when he was sure they were more or less alone in the remote location they had chosen as the rendezvous site. "And how do you know what we are planning to do?" Marek continued, unperturbed by Selerael's statement.

"I interfere for the same reason that your friends have returned in time—I want to destroy the Council and the Emperor—myself."

Marek's eyes widened behind his clear atmosphere mask. "I will listen to your explanation," he offered.

"I followed your man, Hurbef, from the moment he entered the Palace," Selerael began. Marek's eyes darted to Hurbef, but Hurbef appeared confused.

"Is that true, Hurbef? Why did you let her follow you?" Marek asked.

"I—I didn't notice anyone—I tell you she wasn't there!" Hurbef protested.

"It is true, he had no idea I was there," Selerael said. "That I will explain, but first let us withdraw to my dwelling—we'll be noticed here if we remain much longer, and even the other guards may ask to see your military identification cards."

Several hours later, the team of Yulare sat on ancient high-backed chairs inside the cool inner parlor of a small dwelling, a dwelling located in one of the bordering towns that lay many units south of the great dome of Arialsynai. They declined the decanters of refreshment, Selerael offered them, sweet, clear spirits with a scent of spices and several other sweet cakes and fruits. There was business to discuss, and they wanted nothing more than to hear it. So, Selerael sat down to explain the information Marek and his team were impatient to hear—how she had known their intentions without being informed of them and why she would help them, who were strangers to her.

Selerael sat across Marek at the clear, crystalline table at the center of the wide parlored room, and withdrew the atmospheric helmet that obscured her identity. A bird chirped sweetly outside the wide, open colonnade, rustling in bushes that lined the provincial dwelling, and a breeze stirred. As Selerael shook her head to clear the static from her hair, Marek's green eyes, intent upon her face, widened in abrupt surprise.

"It's you!" he shouted, rising.

The others turned to stare at him questioningly.

"I remember you!" Marek continued, oblivious to them, in tones of growing excitement that might not have been well-intentioned. "You came to Yular when I was only a boy. You and your friends met my father the leader of the great city of Gribbio and told him of your world above and beyond the skies..."

The others began looking at her, but she kept a straight face.

"I thought you were sent by the divine spirit, until I learned of what the Empire would do—now I see at least why you were able to follow Hurbef." Marek shook his head vigorously.

"Who is she, Marek?" Hurbef asked, curious as to the answer, but more intrigued by the unusual reaction she had instilled in Marek.

Marek stared hard at Selerael as if expecting her to answer the question herself.

The revolutionary team didn't understand Marek because they had come from the future and he had not. They had returned in time from several thousand years in the future of Yular to stop the Empire, but they had wanted to choose a leader who understood how to act and get through the security of the present that was their past, so they had chosen the son of the last Yular leader to guide them—Marek.

When they spoke of the future to Marek and showed him the proof they had brought, the trust and faith instilled in his heart by the explorers from Seynorynael turned to bitterness and resolution. Thus Marek had decided to help the Yular revolutionaries. The Empire had promised many things to the Yular with words meaningless as wind, but it was a Federation the Seynorynaelian explorers had described which brought Yulare representatives to Seynorynael in good faith, only to find that the Federation was no more.

"I was only a child when you played with me and told me stories of your home world," Marek continued after a silence, ignoring Hurbef's question. "Why do you tell us you are Selerael, when I know who you are—you are Alessia, and you betrayed me and all of my people!" Marek's voice had a sharp edge to it, and the others feared what he might do if this strange woman moved or denied his words. He glared at her, his body taut as a wire, as though he might spring at her to do her harm at any second.

The other Yulare didn't know that Marek held himself still for good reason. The others had never seen any of Hinev's explorers, as Marek had. He knew the folly in assaulting one, for he had seen the consequences first-hand. That alone kept him from attacking her, had he let his hot temper get the best of him.

"I'm sorry for what you've suffered." Selerael responded in a low voice, shaking her head solemnly. "But I'm not who you think I am. I'm not Alessia. Alessia is my mother."

"Your mother?" Marek echoed, visibly affected by this news; his eyes betrayed a fresh notion of doubt.

Selerael looked away to the right, her gaze falling on a mural painted on the wall, of a starship that crashed in the sea.

"Don't blame Hinev's explorers." She added, with a bare hint of unhappiness.

"Oh, and why not?" Marek demanded.

"Because they never meant for your people to be enslaved." She replied. "As they continue on their voyage, they still don't know what goes on here. They still believe that they are bringing the Federation's prosperity to the galaxies. They don't yet know about the formation of the Empire."

"And what do I care what they think?" Marek tossed his proud head.

"I suppose you have no reason to." Selerael admitted. "But understand me very carefully—there have been others who have attempted to do what you are doing now, and they've all failed."

"Then you can understand what we want." Marek shrugged, trying not to be affected by the alarming gravity of her manner. "You said before that you hoped to destroy the Council—so why not join us?"

"Join you?" she said, turning to him again.

"Yes." Marek nodded. "If your abilities are the same as Hinev's explorers, then you could be a great help to our cause. If you know of the Empire's future atrocities, I can't believe you won't help us in our cause if we ask for your assistance."

She didn't answer.

"Yet if you won't," Marek continued, narrowing his eyes on her, "how do we know that you aren't working for the Empire to stop us?"

Hurbef swallowed, his throat tight; the others, suddenly tense, waited and listened, glancing between Marek and Selerael.

"I do intend to stop you," Selerael said stonily, meeting Marek's eyes.

There was a faint scuffling sound as the Yulare abruptly reached for their weapons, but Marek motioned them to stop.

"Explain yourself," he warned.

"I know that you intend to destroy the Main Terminus and erase the memories of Marankeil's mechanized unit and that of the back-up in the underground vault." Selerael returned.

Marek's eyes flickered imperceptibly, as he processed the fact that she knew of their plans and could therefore be a threat to them.

"I saw your group yesterday outside the new Imperial Palace," Selerael continued, "where half of you intend to find and murder the living Marankeil clone at the same moment, obliterating his existence before he can re-implant his memories into another mechanized unit."

"Yes, that is our plan," Marek conceded, glaring at her.

"I also know that you'll fail," Selerael said in a cold tone. "There is a back-up mechanized unit on Maerus' third moon and a clone traveling to Goeur." At this, Marek's eyes darted anxiously to the outer walls of the room and then back to Selerael. "I've been watching the Council for more years than you know," she told him, "waiting for the moment when all of the Council might be assembled together. Until they are, there is no point in trying to destroy them piece by piece—person by person," she added, checking herself and amending her clinical statement.

"What do you mean?" Marek bit out, bristling under her unconcerned self-assurance, even though she showed no sign of taking pleasure in what she told him.

"Even if you should manage to succeed here without being detected beforehand, Marankeil's mechanized back-up will return and re-implant the memories, and he will discover who it was that attempted to eliminate him." She explained. "And be assured, he will retaliate. You will instead ensure the destruction of your own planet and all of your people. You might as well detonate the bomb that will destroy Yular yourself."

Marek said nothing. Hurbef's pain was clear on his drawn, lined face. The news was not merely disheartening to the would-be revolutionaries. They had sacrificed their lives for nothing—they would have to live in the past, unable to act, to fulfill their mission.

"I'm sorry to be the one to tell you all of this," Selerael said after several moments, and the Yulare, whose gazes had fallen low, down to the crystalline table, looked up expectantly.

"However, I will destroy the council one day," she said, a dark edge to her voice that stirred their hearts. "And I will destroy the Emperor Marankeil. In the new future, the galaxies will again be free to grow on their own."

"But, how? How can you accomplish that in one lifetime?" Hurbef said, skeptical.

"Yes, I've asked myself the same thing many times," she laughed. "But I can do it. I will do it."

"Whoever you truly are, I salute your bravery—" Marek began.

She stared at him, interrupting what else he was about to say with a cold, distant expression. He stared back at her, as a fine crease formed between her fair brows.

Selerael shrugged.

"I see I've upset you," Marek said tentatively.

"No," she replied, suddenly laughing, suddenly herself again.

"Yes," he said carefully. "Well then, I was about to say that I salute your bravery, but I can't see how you would be capable of bringing down the Empire on your own."

"You mean after all you've seen, you still don't believe I have enough power to thwart the Emperor?" she said; Marek found her stained laughter disconcerting.

"No, I believe you have power enough, though why you haven't acted yet against the Emperor is all at once something I can't quite figure out. I mean that I don't see why you should want to do it, why you feel it is your destiny. You are Seynorynaelian. Why should you wish to destroy an Empire of your own people, you who have only to gain by your planet's prosperity?"

"If I told you why, I think you wouldn't believe me." She said.

"Please tell us, then." Hurbef interjected. Marek turned to him, and Hurbef shrugged apologetically.

"For family honor, is it?" Marek guessed. "Yet you said your mother did nothing in violation of her own conscience, so—"

"No, it isn't that."

"Then you are a philanthropist? A rescuer—"

She balked, rising so abruptly in her chair that it threatened to crash back to the floor.

"No, I'm not exactly a philanthropist." She said, shaking her head staunchly. "I have a destiny, as I said, a destiny which calls upon me to end the Seynorynaelian Empire, and whether or not I choose to fulfill that role has nothing to do with my own honor or aspirations of nobility."

"Why then? You say I won't believe you—"

"I chose to follow my destiny—because I swore to end the Empire, one day, long ago."

Marek was silent. "I don't understand." He finally said, but he didn't laugh.

"Well, I linger on, waiting to fulfill this role I was born to play in order to preserve the future possibilities dormant in the universe. I'm here because I believe in the dream of a better world in the future, but I can't let you destroy the empire because—frankly you don't deserve to change the past. No one has that right. You can only do what you can do. You can't eradicate the free will of others to choose to follow their fate. Instead, I will wait, and then I will end the evil reign of Marankeil."

"I still don't understand."

"Ah," she said. "That's why you won't succeed."

"No, I mean—how can you live long enough to destroy the Empire entirely? I do believe in excellence and goodness, as you seem to do, and we of Yular do not act in order to be perceived well in the eyes of our fellows but to follow our own minds and hearts. I understand the desire to fulfill actions which can make a positive impact on the world, for that is our only immortality. I just don't understand how you plan to survive—"

"Marek, I am already more than forty thousand years old." Selerael said, staring at him, dissolving the veil she always kept drawn over her eyes.

Marek stared into them only a moment and did not ask his question again.

Marek and the others remained at her dwelling several days, when Selerael found Marek in her holo-room under a projection of a Yular twilight in the mountains.

"You can't stay here in this time," she said, sitting beside him on the lounge panel. "If the Council ever discovers your presence here, they will interrogate your thoughts."

"We won't let them—"

"They'll find you."

"Why do you care?"

"I care about you. But I can't let you go now. If you do, Marankeil might learn of me through you. He'll know that Alessia had a daughter, and that she seeks to destroy him. He'll never let his guard down long enough for me to accomplish that end."

Marek nodded, waiting to hear Selerael's suggestion.

"You're not giving us a choice about this, are you?"

"No."

"So, how did you plan to help us?"

"I have a small centipede gate capable ship, hidden on a slope far to the north of Kerrai. I hid it there many thousands of years ago in anticipation of such an event. It has none of the time checks programmed into its systems for the gate monitor to recognize, so you can journey to the far future through the star gates and if I am successful, escape the Empire's control.

"I must only secure one promise from you first, that you will never tell your stories to anyone, and that you won't influence the lives of other worlds, that you won't use my ship to create your own tyrannical regime on some other planet, or ever interfere with the natural evolution of any species you encounter."

Marek listened and pondered her words a moment.

"For myself and for my comrades, I swear it." He replied, and nodded once, firmly.

"Good." She agreed. "I'm glad that's your decision. Because I'm not going to let you remember any of this, except for your oath."

"As long as you fulfill your promise to us, I can think of no better reward for all of us." Marek returned with a bare smile.

"You can't?"

"No, I can't. For I have never known peace in my adult life, but I remember a dream of it in my youth, a dream we came here to restore to life again. The others have never known what it is not to live in fear, not to be denied rights and comfort when one is weary in soul or in body. If you can give them a dream to cherish and ease their hearts, we will leave you, and leave the future in your hands. For if there is nothing more that we can do, and know that it is hard for us to accept this—if there is nothing we frail mortal beings can do to stop an immortal Emperor, then I thank you for removing the burden of guilt from us. I only wish—"

"Yes?"

"I only wish I could do the same for you."

Entre tard et trop tard, il y a, par la grace de Dieu, une distance incommensurable. The difference between late and too late is, by God's mercy, immeasurable.

—Mme Swetchine

Chapter Thirteen

It was against Ornenkai's will to attend the execution of the Eretaen princehps, but all of the Imperial Advisory Council had been required to be present. The princehps Nelur, or prince Nelur in modern Seynorynaelian, was led from the Imperial Detainment Building to the open amphitheatre sprawling under the turquoise skies of the Arialsynai dome, not far from the Imperial Palace. A spectator crowd milled by the thousands among the amphitheatre, comprised of humanoids and all kinds of aliens from hundreds of off-worlds as well as Seynorynaelians.

Prince Nelur was held paralyzed in a suspension field as soon as he had reached the appropriate spot, immobile until the field dissipated for the firing squad that surrounded him to the front and side. He was given a gun to defend himself, and as a highly skilled and elite warrior, managed to avoid the laser beams directed against him for a few moments as he dropped and rolled between the charges.

The crowds cheered as he took down several guards before he fell at last. The guards circled round him where he lay and released a hundred shots of searing laser beams into his flesh.

At least death came quickly, Ornenkai thought, turning from the sight, disgusted by the cheers of the crowd.

This was the third royal execution in the last century. Most of the aristocracy and leading officials from conquered territories had been brought back to live in Arialsynai as political prisoners, but the more noteworthy and passive ones were treated hospitably. Marankeil had sent loyal, mortal Seynorynaelian governors to rule in their stead. Only Marankeil's mechanized unit and clone and the Vice-Emperor Ornenkai had been permitted to leave Seynorynael—Marankeil had taken all measures to prevent one of the immortal Elders creating another, rival Empire nearby.

The other Elders seemed to have watched the execution with satisfaction. Of course, thy knew that if any of the revolutionaries succeeded in destroying the Main Terminus and the Elder clones, then they would die. Marankeil had ensured that the other Elders could not be resurrected—none of their memories had been stored on another world.

But as Ornenkai watched the prince in his last few moments of life, he could not help but admire the resolve of the unbroken man, who had chosen death to surrender and subjugation.

You won, my friend, he found himself thinking. Marankeil was never able to break you.

Ornenkai found himself thinking of Hinev. Hinev had appeared again in Arialsynai shortly before the Eretaen prince and had been suspected of participating in anti-Empire political intrigues, though no charges could be formed against him; Hinev was careful to erase his tracks. Hinev had tried once again to drum up support for his ancient First Race Theory, as though accepting such a scientific principle might change the course of Empire politics and society. Admittedly, he had made the alarming suggestion that his own theory might not explain the origins of the races across the galaxies, that there was more to the Enorian myths than he had once believed, myths that seemed to be describing the most ancient form of gene alteration on record.

Hinev's radical notions might have caused more general alarm among the Imperial scientists, except that there was no longer any record of the Enorian creation myths to be found anywhere throughout the Empire. Ornenkai knew that Hinev's ideas would never be given the consideration they deserved.

The people called him the "Hinev Pretender"; Ornenkai found it amusing that the population had never known that Hinev and his explorers weren't already dead for more reasons than simple time dilation. Of course, the population thought Hinev was dead; no one gave much thought to his explorers, except that they were the established method of gaining new territory, part of the natural order of things, like the rain that always fell even in years when the runaway greenhouse effect began teetering towards drought, even in the years when runaway glaciation brought only snow, until Marankeil's scientists found a way to restore the climate to the average mean.

Ornenkai hadn't seen Hinev recently, not since Hinev presided over the last clone transfer and shortly afterward, gave his half-strange speech on Enorian genetic manipulation altering the first race, a speech that the Imperial Scientific Council still ridiculed to its supreme amusement. For more than six thousand years since the Empire's foundation, the appearances of Hinev which the population called the Hinev pretenders, thinking each one was a different man, had protested against the death of the ancient Federation, and each time, his ludicrously solemn antics only seemed more amusing to everyone in the elite.

Ornenkai often wondered if they called him the Hinev Pretender as an insult.

Ornenkai kept silent about it, as did Marankeil and the other Elders who knew that the pretenders really were Hinev.

Hinev was a stubborn bastard, though! Ornenkai thought. No matter how difficult his situation became, Hinev kept on fighting against Marankeil whenever he could muster the strength to do so.

At the moment, the planet Seynorynael was divided between those who still privately objected to Seynorynaelian rule and others who enjoyed their supreme status, but fear of the Empire Council and Marankeil himself kept the dissatisfied population from acting or speaking against the Emperor. Marankeil's rule became more firmly entrenched with each passing year. It was nearly impossible to conceive of deposing him. The few traitors were punished by exile if they were lucky, and by death if they led a conspiracy against him.

In the moments after Nelur's execution, Ornenkai discovered that he was no longer angry at Hinev. In truth, he had mourned the genius scientist's disappearance. It had been many years since the man calling himself Fynals Hinev had suddenly given up his anti-Empire campaign and left Arialsynai. Ornenkai wondered why, howeve, Hinev had disappeared.

The unknown reason was that Arialsynai had become to Hinev a place of misery and turmoil; and Hinev had known he could escape the circus Arialsynai had become.

Ornenkai wondered if he himself might ever do the same.

A thousand years after the latest Ephor uprising, the first to occur since the planet had first been conquered, the last of the third cycle of Ephor Wars were finally over.

The sudden end of a long-standing obstacle to the consolidation of Marankeil's rule as Emperor had been quelled at last. But amid the festivities and celebrations that swept the city of Arialsynai, Ornenkai felt an odd bereavement.

For a long time Vice-Emperor Ornenkai had known that Hinev had gone to the cold, peaceful lands of the Celestian provinces across the Great Sea, taking with him a few Seynorynaelians who wanted no part of the new Imperial ways and the Feiari refugees, whose own planet had long ago been destroyed by an asteroid collision.

These Feiari refugees were some of the last handful of their people, and had faced persecution alone and separated in Arialsynai until Hinev's words convinced them to withdraw from the world rather than follow the Eretaens and other off-worlders on the self-destructive course of revolution. Only Hinev could have convinced the proud and angry Feiari that they owed it to the memory of their once numerous people to survive, in any way that they could.

Ornenkai had heard odd rumors about the new Celestian colony from the Martial Force representatives of small cities in the remote Celestian province. Hinev's Celestian colony had been built on the shore of the Great Sea far to the north of the other Celestian cities and the neighboring Kilkoran provinces, outside the weather safe-ring.

The Celestian colony kept to themselves, and it was said that while they had become entirely self-sufficient, the colony possessed no transports, shuttles, and only rudimentary forms of radio communication. Ornenkai had to admire their dedication—they had managed to revert to simplicity and isolate themselves on the most politically active and technologically advanced planet in the seven galaxy groups of the Seynorynaelian Empire.

Ornenkai knew that Marankeil would not interfere—Hinev's retreat was in fact more than Marankeil could have wished for. Not only could he do no further harm to the Empire, but Marankeil knew exactly where Hinev was and how to persuade him to cooperate, if he ever needed the scientist again.

The iridescent bow of the imperial aquashuttle had just reached the shore of the vast Kilkoran Sea outside the Celestian colony, and the clone Vice-Emperor Ornenkai disembarked upon the sandy shore by Hinev's dwelling, blinking in the bright light under the turquoise skies, where no dome protected him from the light of their star Valeria. There was no sound of transports in the air, no sound of the neighboring construction that never seemed to end in Arialsynai outside the Imperial Forum, only the tranquil rhythm of the sonorous waves and the occasional cry of a ceiras bird wheeling above.

"Well, well. Ornenkai!" Hinev cried in amusement, shaking his head. "Tell me, is this merely a visit or do you intend to join our little settlement?" Hinev stood on the wooden deck overlooking the sea, where he had been conducting a lesson before several pupils. Hinev was surrounded by a half-dozen Feiari, part-Feiari, and Seynorynaelian children, all of whom had come to listen and learn from the great founder, a man that their colony Elders said had lived more than a thousand years.

Ornenkai laughed as he regarded the face of the half-race scientist draw into a challenging smile. Hinev seemed in a much better mental state than Ornenkai had seen him in since the long gone days of The Firien Project. Had the peace and quiet restored Hinev's tortured soul? he wondered.

"I thought perhaps I might join you, but I must admit I came on an impulse." Ornenkai answered, stepping from the last step of the shuttle gangway onto the low platform outside Hinev's dwelling that overlooked the sea. "Things have been very difficult in Arialsynai lately—for me." He admitted, uncertain why he felt the impulse to be honest.

Hinev noted the Vice-Emperor Ornenkai's slow response in the ancient language, but said nothing about it. He turned aside and offered Ornenkai a seat on the deck, which Ornenkai accepted. One of the pure Feiari descendants, a young, kind boy, stared at the Vice-Emperor in confusion at the odd language; the boy marveled that Hinev had understood the strange man. Ornenkai, in turn, took no offense to the fact that these children had no idea who he was, that he was the Vice-Emperor of their planet and the entire seven galactic groups ruled by Seynorynael, and yet no one knew who he was here.

"No, Ornenkai," Hinev said, and shook his head wistfully, even as he motioned for the children to continue with their lessons, "even if you gave me your word that you wanted to join us, I would know better than to expect you to stay here. But I have had enough of arguments."

"Arguments? No more talk of ethics and morals?" Ornenkai said, in jest.

"Perhaps a little," Hinev admitted. "But I now prefer the sound of silence to talk, if you must know."

Ornenkai laughed.

"However," Hinev continued. "I will welcome you here, my friend, for as long as you are willing to remain—it is our policy here in Celestian to turn none away and to force none to stay."

Friend? Ornenkai processed the word. Thereafter, he couldn't seem to strike the sound of it from his thoughts.

"I thank you for your hospitality." Ornenkai nodded, trying not to show how much the gesture had meant to him. It is good to see you again, Hinev—my friend, he thought after a moment, as Hinev retreated to send a message to the humanroids within his dwelling to arrange a welcoming feast.

Hinev turned around. "As it is to see you," he said.

"The sea air must do me good," Ornenkai commented a few days later, early one morning. Ornenkai lounged on the deck of Hinev's verandah; it was several hours before Hinev's students were to arrive for a foray into the wild lands beyond the colony.

"The sea air has a magic quality, to be sure." Hinev agreed.

"I can't tell you how much I missed the simple luxury of sleep while I lived as a mechanized unit." Ornenkai said abruptly. "But I imagine you of all people understand that." He added, looking at Hinev as he picked up a piece of sherin fruit that lay on the table.

"Not much for the morning meal, eh Hinev?!" Ornenkai commented, laughing at the lack of provisions in Hinev's dwelling. The fruits leftover from Ornenkai's welcoming feast were now nearly gone, but for the sherin fruit, and the rest of Hinev's offerings were but gruel, urbin roots, and taigh rolls for the children who studied under his tutelage.

Hinev smiled. "I confess I'm not used to the role of playing host. Provisions in the Celestian colony aren't as abundant as they might be, so I don't partake of them—"

"Yes, Hinev, unlike the rest of us, you don't need to worry about the minor matter of eating from day to day." Ornenkai said, in an amused way. "I do remember what that is like."

"I'm sure you do."

"Tell me then, would your colonists object to a shipment of Imperial provisions?" Ornenkai wondered, with an air of intended magnanimity.

"They prefer to cultivate their own food resources," Hinev explained, gazing in distraction across the mirror-like waters of the Kilkoran Sea.

"Then I shall have a supply delivered for myself so that I don't wear away at their stock." Ornenkai declared. "And for the children, I think it can do no harm to have some frisciri sweets included among the rest—"

Hinev interrupted with laughter.

"Surely your colonists wouldn't object to a gift of generosity by one who has imposed upon their benevolent—" Ornenkai began.

"No, no," Hinev said, waving a hand. "I merely laughed because I never really guessed you planned to stay long enough to require additional provisions."

"You extended a welcome—"

"Yes, I did. And now that you've mentioned it, I should tell you that I've already spoken to one of our engineers about building a dwelling for you over on the northern shore—over there." Ornenkai followed Hinev's eyes to the clearing beyond the nearest peninsula, where a small holding had once stood in ancient days, before the original Celestian province was devastated by arctic storms.

Now, Ornenkai laughed, but it was not derisive or artificial laughter; he found himself genuinely pleased by the news.

"I took the liberty of arranging it when you mentioned that you had no immediate plans to return to the Empire Council." Hinev continued. "Tell me, what does draw a Vice-Emperor from his seat of power?" Hinev asked curiously.

"I don't know," Ornenkai admitted and shook his head. "Perhaps—perhaps—no, I guess I really don't know." He laughed.

"I think I know why." Hinev shrugged.

"Oh?"

"You and I—we've stretched ourselves too thin over the years." Hinev said in a contemplative way. "Eventually, a man tires of endless ambition, especially when he realizes it has become the purpose driving him, rather than his means to achieving what he really wants."

"You think I don't know what I want?"

"No, I think that what you want is here." Hinev replied calmly. "You think you want to be like me, and that I will be able to grant you what you want. Perhaps when I've recuperated long enough, you think—I'll become the man I was, enough to help you. And yes, perhaps that will happen.

"In fact, you've already helped me. It is so very refreshing to speak to a man whose thoughts one can't read telepathically, as I'm sure you'll agree. But you've also come here because—I think you can't have what you want. What you truly want is beyond your reach, but the peace of this land is a soothing remedy for a man in search of a purpose, and a man who has grown impatient with waiting for what he has long desired."

"You speak for both of us." Ornenkai observed quietly. "Tell me, Hinev, will this land give me back the power to dream?"

Hinev looked up.

"Was that the price of your immortality as well?" he laughed. "No, Ornenkai, the answer is no. At least—I have found it so."

"No word yet on the return of Selesta," Ornenkai announced over the threshold of Hinev's balcony; Hinev seemed not at all surprised by Ornenkai's sudden re-appearance. Ornenkai had been called away for a brief satellite council meeting in Kilkor and had only just returned, when he found Hinev overlooking the Kilkoran Sea. Ornenkai knew he could always find Hinev here in the early hours of the morning.

"The most beautiful sunrise of any of the Federation worlds," Hinev commented, distracted.

Ornenkai winced at the words, at Hinev's insistence upon defying the power of the Empire, but he knew that Hinev had not regressed into his multi-personality disorder or into his own past. He knew that Hinev refused to speak of the Empire in the Celestian colony.

"Where did you disappear to, all of those years ago—among the Federation planets?" Ornenkai asked, trying to be congenial.

Hinev ignored the question. "I think you will leave Seynorynael someday, Ornenkai. Long before the supernova. And not for a delegation. You will leave Seynorynael for good."

"How do you know that?"

"It's in your eyes." Hinev said.

Ornenkai looked away. "Perhaps I do think about a change of scenery from time to time," he conceded.

"So, the Selesta hasn't returned," Hinev sighed. "Then I've made my decision."

"You're going to remove Calendra from suspended animation then?" Ornenkai asked. He knew the answer; he had received Hinev's call to him in Kilkor and left the meetings early. Hinev needed the help of a man with equal knowledge of biological systems to try to restore Calendra's life.

"There's nothing else for it," Hinev said, swallowing a lump in his throat.

"But you hate to break the promise you made to Kiel."

"Yes."

"Hinev, as you said, there's nothing else for it. Calendra will die soon in that suspension chamber, without ever having lived a full life. Remember, I spoke with Kiel before the serum experiments. Kiel knew that the chambers have always had design flaws—they weren't meant to last more than ten thousand years."

"I expected the explorers to return sooner than this," Hinev said.

Ornenkai suppressed a wave of guilt. It wasn't his doing that Selesta had been gone for so long, even though he had been a part of the Empire Council's decision! he told himself. The thought was of little comfort.

"Seven thousand years is a long time, Hinev. They've been gone so long—we have to face the possibility that they may never return. There hasn't been word of Selesta in some time. And moving Calendra to another suspension capsule won't reverse the age effects on her body—just as you said. Only one of the ancient suspension chambers described by the Firien record-keepers would have preserved her life—"

"Yes," Hinev agreed. "And they had all disappeared by the time I returned with Kudenka's explorers."

Ornenkai coughed, paling against his will. He knew what had happened to the rest of those chambers. Did Hinev suspect Marankeil's involvement in the chambers' disappearance? Of course, Ornenkai thought. Hinev had probably always known, ever since the days of The Firien Project.

"Kiel will understand, my friend." Ornenkai said quietly, with a rare note of sincerity. "You've done all you could to save Calendra."

"But I never gave her the serum, did I?" Hinev said, turning to him. "And now, now it would be too late."

"What are you looking at, Calendra?" Hinev asked, startling the lovely young woman standing on the balcony. She jumped and turned, her eyes flaring in surprise; Hinev suppressed a twinge of guilt, thinking how her long-lashed, soft eyes, round as moons, always managed to seem vulnerable and sad, even when she seemed perfectly happy.

Hinev often remembered back across the years to the time when he had first seen Calendra; she had been lively and innocent back then, during the years of The Firien Project, and though she retained her integrity, he often sensed now that the sadness was gaining ground over Calendra; she was not long for the world.

Calendra had disappeared after the evening meal; but somehow Hinev knew that he would find her on the balcony.

"The stars are beautiful at night here." She said, motioning above.

"Yes, they are indeed."

"And their reflection on the water reminds me of the view at my home in Firien," she said, shivering a little in the cold wind that blew over the sea coast. "You came from Firien, too, didn't you?" she asked innocently.

Hinev nodded.

Firien...

At the word, a sense memory assaulted him, the scent of the ferny, mossy undergrowth in the lyra groves, the smell of the coming winter when he and his mother Undina had gathered the bare sedwi logs for fuel to keep warm...

"Yes, I was raised in the Firien province," Hinev admitted abruptly, managing to sound light-hearted.

"I wonder, I wonder why Kiel grew to love it so," Calendra said, with a light little laugh that held an undercurrent of grief. "He used to say he was going to buy one of the empty Firien dwellings someday when he got his compensation for The Firien Project. He used to say that there was a beautiful place far to the north he had found that would be just perfect for us to live there together, if no one else wanted it—" she stopped.

"Calendra?" Hinev asked gently when she kept staring at the ground.

"Hinev, do you think he'll be back soon?" she asked, in a small voice.

Hinev looked at her, wishing he knew what to do, what to say to her.

"I don't know."

"So, I'll already be dead." She said clinically, nodding once. "Yes. I'll be dead when he comes back—"

She bit her lip but did not cry.

"Calendra—" Hinev said, and his voice suddenly cracked.

"Where is Ornenkai?" Calendra asked suddenly. "Is he still trying to put together a holo-room out of old parts?" she laughed.

Hinev shook his head, marveling at her. Had he been wrong so long ago, when he refused to see her strength? No, her strength wasn't physical, but her heart was stronger than he had ever guessed in the days of The Firien Project. Only now, so many years later, was he able to judge her accurately, not with the complacent hubris that had blinded him, that had made him believe that those who had no education and average reasoning abilities could hardly be valuable to the explorer mission.

Calendra's courage, Hinev saw at last, far exceeded his own.

Then he laughed. Hinev admitted to himself that he found it strange that Calendra had accepted the Elder Ornenkai so warmly over the past half-year; more than that, he found it strange that neither he nor Ornenkai had been obliged to tell her who Ornenkai was before she figured out his identity, even though the Elder Ornenkai she had known as one of Kiel's colleagues at Firien had been a mechanized unit, not a human clone!

"I guess I don't know what I'm missing." She laughed. "They didn't have a holo-room when I grew up, and I don't know what advances the Federation has made since the explorers left." That thought seemed to quiet her for a moment.

"Ornenkai knows he doesn't have to follow our taboos against unnecessary forms of technology here, but he refuses to just have a holo-room brought in from the outside. Now I call that stubborn, don't you?" Hinev said in amusement, at the same time very careful as usual not to mention the Empire or Ornenkai's present title to her, by their mutual consent. What would the present mean to Calendra, who had been born in another aeon, ages past? What would be the point of disillusioning her now?

"Hinev, you do believe that Kiel is still alive, don't you?" Calendra asked.

"I don't doubt it," Hinev reassured her.

Calendra sighed. "Yes, Ornenkai is stubborn," she agreed at last. "He seems to have given up the luxuries I remember he used to bring in from all over Seynorynael, yet he still can't get it out of his head to install a holo-room for the children! Try to reason with him, Hinev."

"I've tried," Hinev sighed. "It's no use, you know that by now."

"Yes, I guess I do."

"Ornenkai feels that the Celestian children can learn better about the other provinces and the ancient history with projections of real holo-footage."

"But they have imaginations!" Calendra laughed. "Why do they need to see everything?"

"Seeing is believing, I've always said. And Ornenkai says that to deprive the youth of an intimate knowledge of the rest of the world will make them forget their virtues. He says the younger Celestian people will forget why the Celestian colony chose to maintain its independence if they don't know what the world is like. He says they should know what goes on in the world, so they don't repeat the same mistakes as everyone else."

"You agree?" Calendra asked.

"Perhaps, and perhaps not, but I am willing to see where this leads, or else he wouldn't be working in my home!" Hinev laughed, then grew serious. "But we've discussed the files already. I only have simple footage, from the days of my youth, and around the time of The Firien Project, and as you know, that was long ago. Anyway, one holo-room won't change—I should say corrupt life here very much."

"Has the Celestian colony grown so very much since its founding?" Calendra asked for the first time.

"Yes." Hinev nodded. "Initially there were fewer than five hundred colonists, and more than three quarters of that number were from Feiar. Early on, we received a few hundred refugees from Helliar, and more still from Feiar living across the galaxy Cluster. In almost three thousand years, the number has increased to over four hundred thousand."

"Hinev—I know that this colony has lost contact with the outer world." Calendra said, pausing. "I don't pretend to ignore the changes that must have occurred to make such isolation necessary—you see, it's clear that few of the others understand me, my ancient dialect, even those of mostly Seynorynaelian descent, and I confess I find it difficult to understand them and their speech."

"Yes," Hinev said, when she stopped, contemplating her words.

"But—anyway, I'd just like to thank both you and Ornenkai for your company and for the hospitality you've shown me." She said. "I won't ask about your motives for releasing me from suspension, but I would like to know, you see I have this feeling that—Kiel won't be returning to me, and I would like to know—it wouldn't have been possible for me to survive long enough to see him again, would it?"

"I think not," Hinev said, but Calendra refused to cry or be comforted.

"I appreciate your honesty, Hinev," she said. "If only I could tell Kiel how sorry I am that I won't be able to see him again. He thinks I'm strong enough to survive, but—I won't be there when he returns—"

"You are far too good, Calendra. Too good for any of us."

She looked at him, uncertain what he meant.

"But you shouldn't thank us. You shouldn't thank me." He said, his voice hard. "We did you a disservice, even Kiel, myself most of all. I hurt you, Calendra. I stole the best years of your life. You should hate me, rather than thanking me. You should not love me and call me friend."

She mistook his meaning. Before he could correct her, she nodded sadly, thinking he had meant to reprimand her for her silly behavior, or for her display of weakness, for being so foolish as to forgive rather than despise the people around her.

"I love to care for others, though it may be silly of me, and foolish to trust," said Calendra. "But love gives me strength, and happiness." Hinev stared at her, as she fought tears, feeling as though she had torn his heart right down the middle.

"I'm sorry to be weak and soft. I just can't hate you, Hinev. You gave Kiel what he wanted most—a chance to do so much for all the world. How could I stand between him and his greater destiny? And how can I hate you for giving him the opportunity to put his talents to better use than trying to survive in the poor north of Firien?"

Tears slipped down her cheeks, but her eyes had a light of resolution in them as she spoke.

"You see, Hinev," she explained softly. "I always knew I was nothing. I had no greater destiny, I knew that. That's why I wouldn't hold him back."

Hinev stared at Calendra; with a sense of the miraculous, he saw that she really didn't harbor any grudges against him, or against Kiel.

"You're wrong, Calendra." Hinev said. Her eyes narrowed expectantly. "You're not nothing. I think perhaps—as I said, you are indeed far better than the rest of us."

And he found he meant every word.

The warm season had come, and for the residents of Celestian, the waters of the Kilkoran Sea had warmed considerably, inviting the residents to the sandy shore in the afternoons. Life in the Celestian colony was filled with hard work, but the crops had been planted early that year, and construction had drawn to an end for the day. Hinev had watched families pass by from his balcony, carrying supplies for a picnic by the shore.

Tempted by the prospect of enjoying the cool water, Hinev headed down for a swim.

A few minutes later, he heard Calendra's feet slapping on the deck and her concerned shout from above the waves. Raising his head above the water again, he was greeted by her anxious face.

"I thought—I'm sorry, Hinev, but I forgot." She explained apologetically, all at once realizing her error. "You were down there so long, I thought perhaps you had drowned. I didn't remember that you couldn't—"

"That's quite all right, Calendra." Hinev laughed, genuinely touched by her concern. Pulling himself from the water, he closed his eyes to remove the water particles and stepped onto the first step, completely dry. "I thought you were still away visiting the Senasus family." He remarked, thinking that perhaps Calendra had been of more good to him than he to her. Her presence alone seemed to have had a remarkable healing effect on him, as well as upon Ornenkai.

"I was, but I came back early. Ornenkai said that he would be returning this afternoon."

"Yes," Hinev said thoughtfully, another pause that Calendra didn't understand. She sensed that there was a strange unspoken bond between Hinev and Ornenkai, and though the two often acted like friends, their emotions could change to animosity at a moment's notice when the conversation moved towards the activities that had begun to tear Ornenkai away from the Celestian province. To Calendra, it seemed there was an unspoken grudge between the two of them, something Ornenkai had done which Hinev could not entirely forgive.

Calendra couldn't imagine what it was. But Hinev and Ornenkai were invaluably dear to her—because they had known Kiel, because they had become a family to her, the only one she would ever have again. She had recognized Ornenkai's identity years before when she awoke—no one spoke the ancient language but she, Hinev, and Ornenkai, and at times he had let reminiscences slip before he checked himself, before he openly admitted she was correct in guessing who he was.

She never did learn how Ornenkai had returned to humanoid form, but she had long ago forgiven the Elder whose Council had sponsored the serum injections, and the scientist who had administered them—Hinev. They hadn't done anything to her out of spite; and yes, she knew, she knew how very hard the two omnipotent figures were both trying to save her insignificant life.

But were they so omnipotent? she began to wonder, for now she knew them, and understood for the first time that they were only as imperfectly human as she was.

Twelve years after Calendra's awakening, her body at last began to show the signs of the degenerative fatigue of the suspension sleep that Hinev had predicted. Her legs began to weaken to the point that she could not stand, and for a time Hinev used his telekinetic ability to help her walk and move.

Then several tendays after she lost mobility of her arms, Calendra found she could not stand or move on her own power without the stumbling of crippled legs, yet she didn't want to be animated by another. Every moment, her body ached with the pain of her bones and joints that decayed and shriveled from within. Once she had been confined to her sleeping panel, Hinev could not bear her suffering and kept the pain from her with a telepathic block on her spine.

The children came to visit her as she worsened day by day, but in time she asked that no one apart from Ornenkai come to visit her at Hinev's dwelling, where Hinev continued to care for her. She began to see a conspiracy among the living and was jealous of them and their activity, watching the families with their picnics, then listening to the children playing on the beach when her body grew too weak to turn her head for a glance outside. Even the song of the kiri birds gave her a resentful feeling.

And then, one afternoon, she decided that she had had enough of the pain. She did not care to prolong the feeling that was robbing her of herself—the pain that was taking away who she was by turning her into a resentful, embittered creature struggling against death.

She wanted to be herself again, and feel no bitterness. That meant that she wanted to let death win at last, for she knew she would die soon.

"Hinev, Ornenkai, there is too much to say..." Calendra said weakly, her throat parched and cracked, her once exquisite eyes now sad and bleary, her face gaunt and pale.

Hinev looked down at the rumpled figure lying on a primitive cot in his dwelling, in the sunlit room beside the balcony, and tried not to let her see the grief that had seized him in these last moments; he knew she was dying. He had seen enough of death to know that she would be gone within the hour.

Calendra watched him as he smiled at her, the man who had taken care of her since her awakening into the unfamiliar realm that the future was to her.

Hinev swallowed a lump in his throat. Calendra—how much he had come to care for her. She alone of all the people in the Celestian colony knew the horror of the multi-personality disorder that he suffered from. She had been there, in the moments when Hinev had forgotten himself, and her presence had often pulled him from the depths of his artificial memories and back into the present, back into himself.

Only now that she was dying did he realize how much she had done for him, how instrumental she had been in returning him to himself, how much more he enjoyed her innocent heart and the wonder of her eyes than the bitter depths of human experience he had known so intimately.

Hinev looked aside at Ornenkai, measuring the Vice-Emperor's expression.

Ornenkai held Calendra's hand tenderly.

"Shall I bring you to the holo-room?" Ornenkai asked.

"No," Calendra managed weakly. "I don't need to see an image of Kiel. I picture him well enough in my mind, you see?" She coughed, dissembling the spell her light, sweet voice cast on her listeners.

Calendra closed her eyes as if to rest them for the moment, then took a horrible, rasping breath.

As Hinev watched her, to his surprise her thoughts reached out to him, inviting him into her mind, into her memories. But he hesitated to cross the barrier between their identities. He could not risk another mindlink. His own identity might begin again to drown in the pool of alien memories he already held.

Then she looked at him with her sad eyes, hollow and swollen now, watery and without luster, and his heart wrenched.

Please, dear Hinev, I know the sacrifice you will be making—but I want my thoughts to be with Kiel someday, and then some part of us will never be separated. If you can, please do this one last thing for me?

After a moment, Hinev abruptly nodded.

Calendra gave him her beautiful memories, the memories of a woman who had been poor and kind, never lost her integrity, who had loved a man so desperately she had sacrificed her life to grant his greatest wish—

When Hinev looked again, Calendra wore a sad little smile, a smile of gratitude, and he saw that she was content in that moment to know that a part of her love lived on. Calendra had never held any malice towards Kiel for leaving her; she had nothing to forgive, and what she regretted, she had now let go. In her heart, she wished Kiel only happiness—

And in that moment, she died.

Hinev and Ornenkai each held on to one frail hand for a time, as the sound of the waves behind them continued unending and meaningless.

Then Ornenkai left the Celestian colony without a word and did not return.

As the obsidian Imperial shuttle descended through the shuttle window of the Arialsynai dome and into the city, Ornenkai cast a weary eye on the technological sea of hard plastics and metallic and crystalloid alloys that now composed the buildings of the city.

He hardly recognized Arialsynai. But then, he hadn't been back to the city since he had gone to live in Celestian, more than a thousand years ago.

The few meetings Ornenkai had been called to attend had been representative council meetings in Kilkor, and a few times he had attended Empire Council meetings via satellite from there, communicating through the transmissions to his mechanized unit in the Main Terminus.

And after leaving the Celestian colony, Ornenkai had slowly journeyed across the planet, observing the changes wrought by the Empire in his long absence. There were still places the ancient Vice-Emperor had never visited, but as he traveled, he had begun to discover that few of the planet's sights remained true to the recollections of his youth.

Now the glimmering tall white buildings of Ariyalsynai that Ornenkai remembered, built from expensive but exquisite Cordan carefully fashioned into lovely colonnades, aqueducts, ornate columns and fountains, were no more. He could see no pedestrian traffic and would not have been surprised to learn that it had been forbidden, and the trees and parks he had created between the city streets and buildings had been uprooted. There were no clear skyway passages above the city. Instead the shuttle navigated through the spokes of horizontal corridors built into the structures of the new buildings to connect the city transport internally.

Ornenkai was inordinately relieved that the Arboretum remained as it always had been, adjacent to the Imperial Advisory Council Building.

"Welcome back to Aryalsynai, Vice-Emperor Ornenkai," the pilot of the shuttle said as they made their descent into a small astroport on top of a city building.

Ornenkai hardly understood him at all.

Selerael knew that Ornenkai had returned to the city. He had avoided the Imperial Palace and returned to the Arboretum, but the relative peace he had found there in the old days was no more. She wondered how he reacted to the changes he observed, but she had no intention of letting him see her again.

During Ornenkai's absence, the number of scientists and Martial Force regulators had increased in the inner dome of the city where the Advisory Council and Imperial Palace were located, and Ornenkai's old laboratory and chambers had been completely dismantled. Even Selerael found it increasingly difficult to gain passage into the inner dome buildings without being noticed at some point by the many guards on patrol. Of course, she knew that she could protect herself, but she nevertheless feared that the more she dared to use her abilities, the more likely Marankeil would discover her, figure out who she was, and flee to some unknown star system.

She wondered if Ornenkai would leave Aryalsynai after having grown so used to the tranquillity of the Celestian colony, but in time, she saw that Ornenkai had returned to his old way of life.

He became again a planetary emissary, a delegate, a conciliator, and went on occasion across the planet Seynorynael, where he was hosted in turn by the provincial governors and elite society; he spent his days in Aryalsynai among the Elders, at Marankeil's side once more, who professed loudly to have missed his friend and asked the Vice-Emperor quite often where he had been for so many long years.

Ornenkai also spent a deal of time on his own, within his private suite of the Imperial Palace, where, by all accounts, he was known to have spent an entire century without so much as taking a single step outside his inner atrium.

Ornenkai searched and searched for something worthwhile to occupy his time and passed the time in whatever pursuit was drawn to his attention, yet nothing satisfied him.

And then one day, more than six thousand years since he had left Hinev and the Celestian colony, news swept the city of Aryalsynai that several thousand Kayrian descendants and a few thousand Tulorian Seynorynaelians had departed for a shuttle to the Celestian colony.

Ornenkai waited nervously for news that the Emperor would retaliate against the deserters, but in the end, and as days turned into tendays, Marankeil did nothing to prevent their withdrawal.

The Emperor wasn't worried about Hinev, or about the supremely backward Celestian colony.

After a while, the Celestian colony was scarcely brought up in conversation, and when the people thought of it, it was with the accompanying feeling that the colony might be dissolved on the Emperor's whim without provocation or warning. The name of Celestian was spoken as though the colony were doomed and was shortly to meet its end.

A thousand years passed. Nothing happened to the Celestian colony.

The notable elite of Aryalsynai seemed to have forgotten Celestian's very existence, until suddenly, more than half of the residents of Firien City and a large number of residents from northern Aryalsynai inexplicably headed to the remote province of Celestian and did not return.

The gift from Hinev arrived unexpectedly. Ornenkai had been away visiting the cities of the Derran plains to speak with the city governors when the package was delivered to the Arboretum, where Ornenkai was at that moment.

"You were almost successful, Ornenkai. If you had stayed a little longer, then you would have had your dream," Hinev's cryptic message read. The ancient letters meant nothing to the praetorian guards who delivered them, but Ornenkai read it with a strange sense of curiosity and nostalgia.

Ornenkai tapped the message receiver and listened to the ancient device that Hinev had used to record his voice, a device so primitive that the praetorian guard hadn't known what to do with it.

Hinev had chosen to speak in the tongue of the ancients, a language that no living Seynorynaelian would understand, except the ancient Elder Council itself. "After Calendra's death, I could not rest until I had solved the puzzle. Since then, I have been deciding whether or not to take you over the barrier, for I have little use for this. I hope my trust in you is not misguided, Ornenkai. Tell me, was there much to celebrate upon your return?"

Ornenkai took the hauler containing the large rectangular case into his new laboratory where not even Marankeil's prying eyes could reach, even if the Emperor were still interested in his ancient companion. As the years had passed, Marankeil had retreated into his own world; he and Ornenkai saw little of each other.

Even after he had returned from the Celestian colony, Ornenkai had shown no desire to fight against the Imperial Order that had been established in his absence in Celestian. The generations of ordinary people on Seynorynael knew no other way of life; disrupting their reality with stories of a free, egalitarian, and humanitarian past would not have shaken their faith in the structure and supremacy of the Empire.

Ornenkai had realized the futility of trying to change anything. There were times when he even imagined that he was already dead and in purgatory, and other times when he merely wished he were dead.

At the moment, Ornenkai stared at the contents of Hinev's gift. Ornenkai stared at it for a long time, though at first he wasn't sure what it was. Then he realized that the missing pieces of the puzzle of Hinev's message were there, if he was willing to figure them out. Hinev had laid out a strange schematic for only one other being to unravel—the ancient scientist that Ornenkai had been would perceive how to read the instructions to make the connections; Ornenkai would know what to do with the millions of micro-unit sized pieces of machinery that Hinev had sent for Ornenkai to assemble.

Ornenkai doubted he could ever duplicate Hinev's device unaided, the device he now saw with a moment of insight from among the schematic prints—indeed Hinev seemed to have engineered it to be so elusively detailed, in order that only Ornenkai of all the Elders might benefit from the creation of the gift.

Hinev had given him the pieces of the first perfect suspension capsule ever designed.

It couldn't be! Ornenkai's heart raced. How? And now of all times?

Hinev had at last discovered how to duplicate the ancient suspension chambers of Enor! From that discovery, yes, Ornenkai knew—Hinev must have then figured out how to temporarily restore a body held in imperfect suspension—to give a spent life such as Calendra's back more than its ordinary life span!

What they had worked on so long to save Calendra—and it had taken far longer than either of them could have imagined to make it a reality!

Alone, Hinev had unlocked the secrets of the Enorian suspension capsules. Unlike the preservation capsule that had eventually robbed Calendra's life, the Enorian capsules had been able to preserve the Enorian refugees for billions of years.

Now, if the schematic could be believed, it seemed that Hinev had found the way to make the rejuvenating effects of suspension sleep linger in the body of the host for ten thousand years after awakening. According to the calculations Ornenkai now held in his clone hands, once his clone body began to wither, a short sleep in the suspension capsule would rejuvenate his body again for another ten thousand years.

Ornenkai's eyes lingered over Hinev's notes; Hinev wrote that he had tested the chamber and discovered its calming effects for himself. While sleeping in the chamber, Hinev recorded that he had been able to dream for the first time in more than twenty thousand years.

When he knew he had succeeded, Hinev had carefully dismantled the machine and sent it to Ornenkai. Yes, dismantling it was the only way to keep it safe from anyone else, for not even Marankeil could have followed Hinev's schematic. Marankeil might have understood the machinery, yes, but Hinev's code was more than mere biomechanical engineering codes. Hinev's schematic hinged on clues only Ornenkai understood, Ornenkai who had lived in Celestian for many long years.

Hinev's gift was for Ornenkai, and Ornenkai alone.

But Hinev had to have known that the chamber alone would allow him the peace in which to dream like a true human being, Ornenkai protested. Nevertheless, Hinev had still given the chamber to Ornenkai, hoping that if the chamber could have such an effect upon a body that had undergone serum-induced metamorphosis such as his own, it could heal even Ornenkai's original body, hopelessly damaged after twenty thousand years in suspended animation.

Why did Hinev do this?

No matter why, in order for the process of restoration to work, Ornenkai would have to act soon—according to Hinev's calculations, Ornenkai's original body was approaching the upper bound of the limit when the rejuvenating effects of the process might work. He had but a narrow window of time to fulfill his greatest dream.

Hinev had known his greatest dream! Hinev had known that Ornenkai wanted to live again inside the body in which he had been born into the world.

Some time later, as he examined the pieces of the machinery, Ornenkai came across a note Hinev had written.

"You know she will never love you, Ornenkai. But I wish you luck."

In a sudden rage, Ornenkai threw the metallic message grid across the room, but it weighed nothing and fell uselessly in the middle of the floor among the other pieces.

Ornenkai paused, breathing hard.

So Hinev had known all along that he loved Alessia. And Hinev thought Ornenkai would choose at once to restore himself.

Hinev also knew that if Ornenkai returned to his original body, he would never be able to win Alessia. No, Hinev's explorers, Kiel, and especially Marankeil, would never allow the Vice-Emperor to join them on Selesta, not as long as his identity was known to them.

Unfortunately, the human face of Ornenkai was the second most recognizable across the Seynorynaelian Empire.

On n'est jamais trahi que par ses siens. One is never betrayed except by one's own friends.

Chapter Fourteen

"Hinev? What is it?"

The voice startled the man sitting on the deck of a balcony overlooking the rough water of the Kilkoran Sea. The chill air was heavy and dank with moisture but not oppressive, tasting of a passing storm cloud that hung low over the sea, with its splotches of rolling dark grey.

"What?" The violet-eyed man turned, and looked at the face of a middle-aged Seynorynaelian woman who had become third-in-charge of the Celestian colony. Her great-grandparents had come to the colony only ninety-seven years earlier with the large groups of Seynorynaelians who had sought out the peaceful Celestian haven, and Celestian life was all Mirako Riarsenn knew. Hinev himself had taught her much about politics and had come to rely upon her when his own mind track failed him—no, his mental condition had grown far worse than that.

There were times when he was surprised by Mirako's loyalty to him, for when Fynals Hinev ceased to be and became one of a million identities inhabiting the shell of his immortal body, the creature he became was indeed capable of anything, moral or immoral, violent and barbaric or highly civilized—and over the power of those invading memories, memories surfacing from the depths and murkiness of Hinev's subconscious, his own identity had absolutely no control.

Once, long ago, Fynals Hinev had been able to control the memories, but no longer. His own conscience had conspired with them to create a living purgatory for him.

There was no escape for him, no escape but for death to find him, and she had long ago given up hope on him.

"Are you—"

"No," Hinev said with a laugh. "I'm still here."

"Who are you?" Mirako asked carefully, in a way that suggested she'd been obliged to ask before.

"Fynals Hinev," he replied, with a keen eye.

Mirako appeared relieved.

"Shall we keep discussing the plan or do you want me to go?"

"I assure you I'm fine," Hinev said quickly, "and we've got to finish the plan before someone betrays us to the Council—"

Mirako's eyes flared wide.

"I have no doubt Marankeil would like any excuse to put a permanent end to our little subversive colony." Hinev explained.

"Surely no one here would betray the colony—" Mirako protested, aghast.

Hinev laughed, a laugh of wisdom.

"Perhaps there might not be any spies here among us," Hinev amended himself, sensing Mirako's fear, "but if even one man among our recent arrivals inadvertently betrays our plans in a social communiqué to friends he has left behind, we could be discovered. And nothing we send is not unmonitored, of course."

Mirako nodded soberly. "I know."

"Yes."

"But I still don't like the idea of splitting the colony into two spaceships." Mirako said, resuming the discussion. "I realize that any kind of trip outside the Kudenka ring will mean we've got to provide ourselves with plenty of supplies, and if you say we shouldn't stop and resupply ourselves on an Imperial planet, I won't question that. But an extended space journey—most of us don't even know how to pilot a transport, Hinev. How many of them do you think will want to get on board a spaceship, much less live out the rest of their lives on one heading to some far off planet? And then to hear that you want to break up the colony for however long it takes to get there—"

"There is no ship big enough to hold the entire colony, except the Grand Fleet, and Selesta—"

"Sill-what?" Mirako asked, benignly curious.

"Nothing," Hinev said quietly, and shook his head. "Nothing at all." He said, but at the same time, a faraway look crept over his face. "I'm sorry, but we'll have to resume our discussion later," he said absently.

"You all right?"

"No, but at least I'm still myself." Hinev replied.

Mirako sighed, then nodded and took her leave, retreating from the deck into Hinev's dwelling and then down to catch a transport to the other side of the colony, where the newest buildings had been constructed on the undulating meadows.

Hinev sat for a long time, then shot bolt upright.

The air of Celestian had never tasted more electric, even though the storm clouds had dissipated somewhat. Hinev stared out at the horizon, into the wind that compressed his face.

Where was it? he thought, with the giddy enthusiasm of a child. He broke into a run and scrambled deftly into his dwelling, like the wild young boy he had been in the forests of Firien.

He found the primitive long-range communications device, activated it, and waited, listening, tense as a taut wire. He waited in that position for several long hours until he heard the groundshaking news, news that had the power to immobilize his soul.

After nearly fifteen thousand years away from Seynorynael, Selesta had returned at last to the Valerian system.

Hinev arrived in Aryalsynai the evening before the Selesta was expected to land in the capital; with him were his two most trusted subordinates from the Celestian colony, Mirako Riarsenn and Gian Holmze.

Fynals Hinev could hardly remember the last time he had been to Aryalsynai; the current city using that name was unrecognizable to him. As the trio traveled through the city, even Mirako and Gian found it difficult to communicate with fellow Seynorynaelians, whose speech had become truncated and strangely accented in the two hundred years since the latest Celestian colonists brought Imperial culture to Celestian.

The Celestian colony was still recovering from the discovery that the Federation was no more and had been replaced by the Seynorynaelian Empire for nearly fifteen thousand years! And, though Hinev had used his mental powers to dull the memories from the weary refugees who had sought out the colony, the Celestian peoples were slowly being re-exposed to the culture their ancestors had fought to escape.

Hinev knew that the Celestian colony must leave Seynorynael in order to survive. Disturbing rumors of Imperial retaliation against subversive factions had begun to reach even the remote Celestian colony. Sadly enough, the man known as Hinev, who had protected the Celestian peoples since antiquity, was becoming less and less capable of protecting the colony, and he was aware of this himself.

Hinev had planned to do everything in his power to help the Celestian colonists escape Seynorynael and rebuild their lives, perhaps even restore the flower of Seynorynaelian civilization, on another planet.

Mirako and the noble, amiable Gian stood by Fynals Hinev on the observation deck of the tower room they had taken in Aryalsynai's visitor center when the Selesta appeared in the clear turquoise skies above the capital, growing from a distant glimmer until the minutest detail of it could be made out.

The ship passed by. Hinev stared at it, with an expression of wonder more profound than that which impacted any of the astonished onlookers throughout this southern part of Aryalsynai. To them, the return of Selesta was merely a fleeting curiosity.

There was no way of describing all that Selesta's return meant to Hinev.

Hinev stood blinking at it, his eyes just barely moistened as he compressed them together forcefully and dared a new look with every passing second.

Selesta loomed close, and the rounded command center near the bow turned aside. Above the ship, attached almost seamlessly, was another vessel of different hue and origin, the smaller starship Sesylendae that had been home to Fynals Hinev and the remaining circle of six in his own explorer days. The last microunit of the stern passed before the trio; after that, Selesta began to shrink once more, gradually descending towards the appropriate astroport where the air authorities had directed her to land.

Several tendays after the Selesta had landed, Hinev was still busily trying to contact Kiel, Alessia, and the other explorers who had been taken to the Imperial Palace. He had no doubts that he could have gained access to the building, but any meeting he orchestrated could not remain secret in Marankeil's domain, and Hinev had no desire to go anywhere near the Emperor himself, for the sake of the Celestian people, and for his own. Hinev was afraid, afraid to risk Marankeil's thoughts entering his mind now that his own mental control had deteriorated.

Hinev simply could not enter the Imperial Palace without risking Marankeil discovering his plans.

Hinev heard that Marankeil had recently canceled the proposed mission launching site for future explorers that was to have been established on the Celestian planets in the white-star Rigell system. Not only were the planets too remote to outfit, but Marankeil had no taste for the territory where they were located, next-door to the lai-nen system. He had only wanted the Celestian worlds when the lai-nen occupied the Rigell system, but all of the lai-nen had supposedly been killed, and their home world and colonies destroyed. No word had ever been heard of the lai-nen who had been rumored to have survived that annihilation so many thousands of years ago.

When Hinev learned that there were no immediate plans for the uninhabited Rigell system, he made a decision.

He was going to take the Celestian colonies to the remote Rigell system.

Rigell, yes Rigell was the only territory he could think of where the Celestian peoples could go and live in peace. The nearest centipede star gate to the Celestian worlds had been created by the lai-nen and collapsed when the mechanisms holding its porthole open were destroyed; many of the lai-nen's gates and innovations had even been destroyed by their own race near the end of their empire, to prevent Seynorynael from acquiring them. So a journey to the Celestian system was going to take many years even from the closest Empire star gate, and hopefully the distance would prevent Empire interference once the Celestian colony had been relocated.

Hinev found Ornenkai in the Seynorynaelian Arboretum a few tendays after Selesta had landed. Hinev ventured there alone, without Mirako and Gian, who would never have been able to gain access to the Arboretum unaided; but of course, the security gates of the Imperial Forum had no power to keep back an immortal.

"Creator above! Hinev!" Ornenkai cried, strolling past the near-extinct keln tree collection when a half-race man of striking violet eyes met him from the nearest intersection.

It had been more than seven thousand years since they had last met, and only a few short years since Hinev had sent his gift to Ornenkai.

Ornenkai and Hinev stood facing each other, each thinking that the man they surveyed was no longer a man the other knew.

Hinev's eyes had a strange dark glimmer to them, an unhealthy brightness that made Ornenkai uneasy. It seemed that suddenly all of the years of Hinev's life had caught up with him at once, not in appearance, but in the unending memories following him, surrounding him, weighing upon his soul like exotic matter itself.

Hinev was a man being hunted into oblivion, while Ornenkai, in contrast, had the appearance of a man whose eyes would search to the end of oblivion and the end of the universe to find something to believe in; neither had any understanding of where their self-destructive journeys would lead.

"I came to ask a favor," Hinev said without any word of greeting. Again, as always, he used the language of the ancients with Ornenkai.

"Perhaps I can guess." Ornenkai said in the same forgotten speech, struck by how immediately familiar the two of them were once more. Was it so easy to resurrect the ancient days with the power of this speech? "You would like me to organize a meeting between you and the explorers." Ornenkai said, laughing, laughing for the first time in a century, and his laugh had the broken quality of a rusty hinge.

Hinev nodded.

Ornenkai's eyes clouded over with an unreadable look of distraction.

"I'm sorry, Hinev," he said at last, moving away from the keln trees and onto the broad pathway, "but even I am not permitted to enter the section of the Imperial Palace where they have been detained, or I would have already gone there myself." Ornenkai took a moment to shrug; Hinev knew it was artificial, this outward composure Ornenkai chose to wear for public display.

Hinev looked at him with keen eyes, then broke off and walked away a few steps; he sat heavily on the bench panel by the keln grove.

Watching him, Ornenkai was struck by an odd pang of pity. The strength of Hinev's once sharp senses had all but disappeared; the brilliance of Fynals Hinev struggled against drowning in misery, and after twenty thousand years, the immortal man was on the verge of losing that fight.

Ornenkai was momentarily overwhelmed by a lost feeling. Why was he living in the present, in this here and now?

"Marankeil's trust in friendship must be failing him, among other things," Hinev laughed abruptly, absurdly amused by his own comment. "Imagine—a Vice-Emperor who cannot go where he wishes."

Ornenkai walked over to join him at the view, but he remained standing. He looked at Hinev without any malice, without taking offense to Hinev's comment.

I don't suppose you've heard, Hinev, but—I might as well tell you that Marankeil has plans to return himself and the other Elders to mechanized form."

Hinev stopped breathing, blinked, swallowed, then summoned the courage to look Ornenkai in the eye. He said nothing.

"You're surprised?" Ornenkai laughed without mirth. "So was I. In part, anyway. Marankeil is—well, he grows more fearful day to day of being destroyed by the ill will of revolutionaries, to put it kindly. He sees a conspiracy where there is only a suggestion of discontent. He will not remain as a clone for much longer."

When Hinev still said nothing, Ornenkai leaned back on the bench and let the silence reign a moment; the only sound in the quiet Arboretum, an Arboretum of an elite that now little cared for idle tranquillity, was a soft, stirring breeze and the random chirps of a limeesi bird.

"Marankeil has already planned to send the explorers on another mission." Ornenkai said a moment later, his voice deliberately steady.

"What?" Hinev turned to him, in a voice that sounded strangled.

"He intends to keep Selesta—Kiel and the others—away from Seynorynael—perhaps forever." Ornenkai said. "I discovered it recently, yes, when I made inquiries. There seems to be so much going on without my approval or consent." He laughed, a hollow, dry, short little laugh.

"Ornenkai—"

"Hinev, had you ever thought what was going to happen when Kiel and the others found out about the Empire?"

Hinev's eyes narrowed. "Have they—"

"I don't know. But if they don't yet know about it, it won't be long before they do. But—"

"You don't want to be there, right?" Hinev said.

"No, I don't." Ornenkai admitted. "I would rather not have to face their judgment at the moment. Or face them when—Marankeil is already planning to force them to swear loyalty before the Council—"

"What?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so. He'll find a way to do it, I have little doubt. And I believe the mission he has devised for them is his way of ensuring that they keep their vow. He—he still thinks Alessia—that Alessia—"

"What about Alessia?" Hinev demanded, his voice suddenly solid and resonant, as it had been so very long ago.

"Nothing," Ornenkai laughed.

Hinev shrugged, but Ornenkai wondered how much he suspected. Did Hinev know that Alessia was the one destined to destroy the Emperor Marankeil? And should he—should Ornenkai trust any information to a man who could not control his own mind, who could easily leak information to Marankeil through no fault of his own?

"So, my friend, I see you have yet to make use of my gift to you." Hinev said, his voice laced with secret amusement.

"No," Ornenkai admitted, coming out of his own thoughts. "Not yet."

"I wonder how Marankeil will feel about it," Hinev laughed. "You have told him you aren't planning on resuming your mechanized unit form, haven't you?"

"No. I imagine he assumes I will follow the others, since so many of them agree with him."

"They do?"

"You may think it foolish, but perhaps you never learned that several of our Elders within the Advisory Council have died in recent years before they could record years of experiences. Their surviving mechanized unit forms decided not to re-imprint memories into the new clones waiting for them under the Main Terminus. They decided it was intolerable to lose a thousand years of experience, what seemed to them like awakening a thousand years in the future—"

Ornenkai broke off; Hinev thought of Calendra at the same time.

"In any event, all of the Elders will be reincarnated into the mechanized units." Ornenkai explained. "The price of betrayal is death, even for an Elder. As you may have heard, Elder Baladahn is no more, and his memories have been erased for his betrayal against Marankeil with several groups of revolutionaries. And Marankeil seldom talks of resuming the experimental serum transfers as he once did."

"So he will no longer require my services," Hinev surmised. "Either for his clone incarnations, or to resurrect the serum—and of course, he will no longer have a reason to preserve the Celestian colony—"

"Yes," Ornenkai agreed. "Though he may still be deliberating his course of action, I think—rather, the truth is that we were machines for too long. We lost our humanity for too long to ever be able to re-claim it entirely."

Hinev said nothing for a while, but in a moment of clarity, he stared hard at Ornenkai and seemed to read the Vice-Emperor's thoughts.

"So, I see," Hinev said. "You aren't going to use my gift, after all."

Ornenkai turned to face him sharply, in acute surprise.

"But, Ornenkai," Hinev added, "you don't strike me as a man preparing to meekly return to his mechanized unit form, either."

"Truly?" Ornenkai said.

"You're planning something, my friend."

"Perhaps," Ornenkai admitted. "Marankeil doesn't listen to what happens here," he said, when Hinev looked around warily, nervous in case their conversation were being monitored by Praetorian guards or by hidden monitoring devices Hinev hadn't detected, even with his highly acute senses. "This is my Arboretum," Ornenkai insisted, when Hinev seemed to question his sincerity.

"Perhaps," Hinev agreed. "But there is little point in my tarrying here, is there? I suppose I shall have to find another way to speak with Alessia."

Ornenkai flinched, but barely.

"I would like to know what you're planning," Hinev said, "but as you know, it wouldn't be safe to trust me with your information, nor I with you. Will you, though, Ornenkai?"

"Will I what?"

"I wonder, will you choose her, or yourself?"

Ornenkai stared at Hinev as the man got up to leave.

"You knew—your gift—"

"Every possibility is a test, Ornenkai." Hinev laughed. "Because as you well know, for every choice we make, for every path we choose to lead, we must sacrifice the other possibility. Will you find a way to infiltrate Selesta, or will you choose human immortality? No, don't tell me, Ornenkai. I did not ask in order to pass judgment on you. I should be the last man alive to sit in judgment over his fellows—"

"Hinev," Ornenkai said, looking hard at the remarkable man, a brilliant light holding out against his own damnation.

"Yes, this is likely to be the last time we will see each other in this world." Hinev said cryptically, reaching forward to clasp Ornenkai's outstretched hand briefly.

"Good-bye then, Hinev, my friend." Ornenkai said, as the other man slowly departed; a moment later, Hinev disappeared among the lyra trees on the path far ahead.

Ornenkai sat for the longest time, his thoughts sifting over the eternity of his life.

"There is no Ilika any more," he said suddenly and rose from the grove of Keln trees with a decisive step he had never taken in all of his life.

"And no matter what it takes for me to achieve it, this Empire—and Marankeil himself—will die."

With all the creeping quiet of a mere shadow, Selerael found her way into the dark, echoing hold that contained the greatest explorer spaceship of Seynorynael, now grounded on its home planet.

Selesta.

Selerael had resisted its lure for several tendays, ever since she learned that Selesta's crew had been drawn away to the Imperial Palace.

Selerael's feet seemed to have found their way to Selesta of their own accord, and she would not fight them. She lingered a moment under the broad arch before the gigantic hold, the docking bay of the southern Aryalsynai astroport, and there, as she looked upon the liquid blue luster of the spaceship she knew as intimately as her own body, she felt her breath still in her throat and her heart racing wild.

She had not seen the home of her youth in more than thirty thousand years. Oh, Selesta, her heart cried to it; here was the ship that held her most precious memories for her, when she had been obliged to put them by in order to move on and fulfill the mission for which she had been born.

Time toys with me, she thought. But doesn't it toy with us all? Allowing us to remember what we can never have again, taking youth and life from human bodies while allowing memories of youth to remain?

Precious Selesta, bless God for allowing you to stay with me all these years, Selerael thought as she headed towards her.

Passing secretly through the ship's security perimeters, Selerael headed into the Great Bay, past the thousands of Valerian fighters and down the main corridor towards the crew quarters and then onto the bridge. She lost countless hours wandering the familiar hallways; nothing had changed, while she had become a stranger to herself.

As she entered the Seynorynaelian lyra forest, she felt the energy of the trees reaching out to touch her. She reminded herself to telekinetically erase the marks she had made in the familiar dirt pathway before she left and headed down to the bridge over the stony river deep in the hold.

When she awoke from a long sleep by the earthen banks where Faulkner had died and her own family, and her lost husband Dimitriev had enjoyed their days together, she turned from the forest for the last time.

There was nothing here for her now, nothing but memories that pained her, nothing but emptiness and the shining lyra, wise and solemn, whispering to her.

Now she understood what they said, but she didn't want to listen any more.

She left the forest and continued a brief tour of the ship, unable to resist the grain of desire driving her. Then, near the bottom stern of the ship, she heard a noise ahead and hid in the shadows of an intersecting corridor.

Who was it? she wondered. No ordinary person could gain access to Selesta, and all of the explorers were in the Imperial Palace!

A man hidden within his vermilion robes passed by her, hauling several loaders, followed by a slow-moving Elder's mechanized unit. Surely this wasn't Marankeil! she told herself. She knew to speak to him was to risk exposing herself, but curiosity won over caution, and she searched the air for brain impulses, escaped thoughts that might give her a clue as to the Elder's purpose but not directly alert him to her presence.

Meanwhile, Elder Ornenkai stopped before another terminal, unaware of his silent observer. His mind was focused upon his task, and upon fulfilling the long-deliberated decision he had just made.

Selerael recognized the man: it was the Vice-Emperor.

And Ornenkai's mind was abruptly intent upon one thing and one thing only: to remain with Alessia by any means necessary. Clasping the thought was the only way to prepare and empower himself for what he was about to do. He put on the metallic helmet that connected him to the mechanized unit behind him and transferred his thoughts and experiences for the last time. Then, at the clone's instruction, the mechanized unit that held all of his memories moved closer and attached its arms and head into the imput terminal.

At last Ornenkai's mission became clear. He had come to give his memories to Selesta. Selerael realized she was witnessing the process that had left Ornenkai's being trapped in the main computer that was Selesta's central nervous system.

Ornenkai...

She turned away and closed her mind off to the scream.

The pain, pain as cruel as Hinev's serum had inflicted, went on for a considerable time, and the scream seized the walls, echoing down like a faint whisper of Selesta's horror.

The ship wailed with him for a long time, until at last it itself surrendered to its creator and master, and the walls were at once imbued with a new sentience.

Why? Selerael wondered pointlessly. Why had Ornenkai done it?

Marankeil's plan was now to return to a machine existence, Selerael learned in the moments just before Ornenkai's soul merged with Selesta's computer; she learned this news with a sense of horror. She knew what fate Marankeil had now chosen; Marankeil would truly become a machine that viewed life itself as a threat to its existence—and then no world, no culture, or individual being would be safe.

That was why Ornenkai had betrayed him. Of course, she knew that he had deliberated against taking sides against his childhood friend. After all, Ornenkai had traveled the same path as Marankeil, and she had followed them both for many long years.

It was clear to her that Ornenkai clung to his new faith, a new faith that the Seynorynaelian Empire could be destroyed, as the Enorian legend had once predicted. After all, hadn't he seen Alessia in the Arboretum before Selesta returned from its first mission? He had believed she had risked seeing him that day to ensure that he knew what she was doing and joined her cause. He would help her retrieve the singularity that the legends of Enor had said would come from Kiel3, so that she could return to the past as she had clearly done already. Then at last she would return to do what he could not, to destroy Ilikan Marankeil.

And by doing so, save Ornenkai's soul the only way possible.

Long moments passed before the empty mechanized unit that had once held Ornenkai's sentience detached, and it nodded. Selerael felt the memories in the mechanized unit fading to the point of basic programming. Ornenkai had imparted his soul into Selesta; the equally dying clone, now holding but shadowed memories of Ornenkai's former life, looked towards the computer terminal with sad eyes. The sensation of impending nothingness that approached filled the clone's heart with pain.

As the mechanized unit and clone prepared to leave, she watched them load the strange suspended animation capsule off one of the loaders and followed them down the corridor where long ago she had found the bodies of Selesta's crew. Not daring to come too close, she watched from a distance as the pair entered the chamber and then re-appeared without the clear suspension capsule they had towed. The capsule wasn't like anything she had ever seen, not like the one she was doomed to sleep within on her journey to Earth, or like the ones that would one day hold the dead bodies of Hinev's explorers until their disappearance in the white hole singularity of Kai-rek.

The clone's thoughts were now centered upon something odd, something she remembered from seeing her mother's memories. Ornenkai had given his mechanized unit one last mission: to deliver a programmed message to Kiel and his explorers within the next few days, a message that he had betrayed Marankeil to help them, a message that would urge them to make the journey to Kiel3 once more, where the Enorian singularity fated to destroy the Seynorynaelian Empire might be found. As for the clone, it had but one more action to make—to return to the Arboretum to die.

Yes, it had to appear as though Elder Ornenkai had tired of living and had simply orchestrated his own demise. Ornenkai had already done the unthinkable in programming his memory bank stored in the Main Terminus to self-destruct after the Selesta's launch.

Selerael had never before realized how very tortured a soul Ornenkai was, or how great his sacrifice had been when he voluntarily condemned himself to his tomb, the computerized memory bank of Selesta.

Ornenkai—the ship was unaware of her, for she had taken pains to conceal herself, there in the corridor, but she sensed the horror within; Ornenkai had yet to recover from the shock of finding his soul trapped in an impotent machine incapable of any physical feeling once more.

She turned away, her head bent low, then followed the clone and mechanized unit at a distance out into the Great Bay and outside into the astroport's main hold.

The mechanized unit turned and headed towards the exit, hurrying away to the Imperial Science Center to continue the facade of Elder Ornenkai's existence until it was time for the explorers to depart.

The clone, however, remained several moments longer in the holding area, gazing up the side of the towering space vessel before it left. Selerael followed it into a transport back to the city, and finally into the Arboretum itself.

Why? she wondered. Why was she following him? Why could she not leave him to die in his loneliness?

"Elder Ornenkai," she said at last, as the clone came to a weary halt under the high, arching bow of a sedwi tree.

Startled, the clone turned towards the musical voice that had spoke in ancient Seynorynaelian, the dialect of Alessia's youth. As the clone spied Selerael standing in the pathway behind him, a slight smile appeared around the corners of his mouth.

"Ah, Alessia, you have returned," he said, in a voice overwhelmed by joy. "I knew it was you I saw all those years ago." He stepped blindly towards her, but she was beside him in a moment. He reached out and haltingly touched her cheek with infinite tenderness.

Selerael winced inwardly, considering that she should let the Elder know her true identity—or should she let him believe what he wanted to believe? He took her hesitation as a sign that he had guessed correctly, that she was afraid he might tell the other Elders that Alessia had returned to the past.

Marankeil has suspected all these years—I wonder, did he recognize Alessia from an accidental meeting with her future self sometime in his past? Ornenkai thought. Yet why is she here, now? Unless—can it be that in the future, Ornenkai has won her heart at last?

Selerael suppressed a smile, but a shadow of it appeared on her lips. She had been listening to the clone's private thoughts, but her telepathic invasion only confirmed his assessment of her identity in his mind.

"Alessia, there's no need to worry. I won't reveal your secret," Ornenkai reassured her. "I won't be returning to the Council. Marankeil will learn nothing of this meeting—I have not much longer to live. But you already know that, don't you?"

Selerael said nothing. Some unknown realization struck the clone then, and it hurriedly looked away.

"Please, don't look at me. I want to read nothing in your eyes. You see, I am no longer Ornenkai. I am nothing, but I hold a shadow of his memories... and I wish to know nothing of what his future might bring because—it is a future I can never share." The clone swallowed.

"Ornenkai, you have to listen—" she said; strangely, he turned to her, unable to fight against his own curiosity.

"I see," he said, sobering after judging her face a moment; he did not elucidate further what he had seen. "Alessia, wait—I have remembered something," he added a moment later, his eyes at once uneasy.

"Yes?" she said; she wasn't going anywhere!

"I fear I must speak quickly before my memory fails." He told her, growing increasingly animated.

Creator above, don't let me forget now! he thought. Let me know myself, here! Don't let me forget her now that she is here with me in this place!

"Ornenkai, you won't forget, not for a while—"

He didn't seem to believe her. His face took on a quality of panic; she tried to calm him, holding his arms, but he only clasped her more tightly. Finally she succeeded in getting him to sit on the bare, gnarled ground, where he could conserve his remaining energy.

"Alessia, you are here to destroy the Empire, that I know, but you will never be able to destroy the back-up systems of Marankeil alone. You must search my memory now, before you do anything else. There was once a list in my mind that will allow you to find all of Marankeil's clones and mechanized units. With it should be the access program that will allow you past the memory lock to reprogram the units.

"The clones are sealed in suspension capsules I helped to create. The access code to open the capsule's monitoring systems should still be the same. Marankeil would trust only Maerodach and me with the codes, but he is able to do so because he believes none of the Elders will ever leave the planet or risk being terminated—"

"Ornenkai—" she could hardly believe he was so willing to tell her how best to destroy Marankeil, the spectre that had haunted his life.

He had given her the key to the end of the Empire.

"But remember, Alessia, you must only reprogram the units." He interrupted with a note of urgency. "The security systems are set up to alert the territorial governors if any of them are destroyed. The safeguards are not against erasing the memories the units contain, and few have thought to attempt what might seem impossible fearing it might sound a warning—"

"Then how—"

"Hear me out." He said, then resumed where he had been interrupted. "You can, however, approach the units without them reading your intent, and the access code will override the back-up systems. Marankeil made sure of that in case one of his own units decided to usurp his authority. They maintain only passive memory, and can't act unless threatened."

Her eyes lit up with comprehension. Could it be? Could it be Ornenkai who would make her mission possible?

"Now, in order to terminate the clones, you should set the capsule life cycle maintenance on low." Ornenkai explained; his voice was weakening, but he seemed oblivious to it. "The clones will begin to decay slowly, but the capsule will keep them alive. So no one will suspect your interference. However, the moment the capsule is opened again, they will immediately cease to function. You see, if you try to kill the clones directly, the monitoring system will register a termination, and Marankeil will be alerted to the assassination attempt. He will immediately check to ensure that the other units are safe, and if they have been tampered with, he will be more careful to protect them in the future. In that event, you will never again get such a chance to succeed.

"Don't worry," he added gently, as though sensing her concerns. "Marankeil won't learn that I have told you how to destroy him. I have only a few hours left of life, and my ability to remember is failing—fast, I fear. And there are no monitoring devices here in the Arboretum."

"Thank you, Ornenkai," Selerael said, her eyes glistening with bitter tears betraying her feelings to him. Ornenkai's expression softened as he looked at her.

"Alessia—"

"I have the programs." She said after she had searched his memory and found them. "Thank you, Ornenkai."

"Good," he sighed. "Do what you must with them."

"I will, Ornenkai." She said. "I swear to you that your sacrifice will be justified. And I thank you—for all you have done."

"Yet isn't it strange?" the clone laughed. "The Ornenkai that will live beyond this day might never know how close he came to fulfilling his mission. I am the only part of Ornenkai that will ever know that you are here for certain, that you will bring the Empire to an end, and I shall die before the sun sets today." She allowed him to lean against her as they sat there under the boughs. He sighed, contented to rest his head against her shoulder.

"Alessia?" he asked, his voice barely a whisper now.

"Yes?" she said, not denying the identity.

"Will you stay here with me until I die?"

"Yes, Ornenkai, I'll stay with you." She said softly.

The clone that had been Ornenkai had no longer any energy left to speak.

When the clone died in her arms, as the last rays of the afternoon sun cascaded through the dome of Aralsynai, she lifted the body in her arms and carried it to a resting place on the smooth, age-worn roots of a sprawling sherin tree.

On the morning following the death of the clone of Ornenkai, Selerael passed through the more crowded upper sections of the main astroport on her way to the disembarkation lounge that would take her on a starship to the third moon of Maerus. Selesta would be leaving soon; the mechanized unit of Ornenkai would deliver its message to Hinev's explorers and stage Ornenkai's death, probably within the next few days.

Selerael had already decided that she could not remain on Seynorynael. One moment longer, and she knew she would give in to the temptation of arranging a meeting with her mother, Alessia, and that would be catastrophic to her mission.

Instead, Selerael had decided to leave the planet and investigate what Ornenkai had told her about the Emperor and Advisory Council's back-ups units. She had to concentrate on a plan of how best to destroy them all.

However, she could not have picked a worse—or better—moment to catch the Maerus transport, if indeed some small part of her hadn't deliberately chosen this time and place to quit the planet. As she passed through the astroport on her way to the Maerus departure gate, milling groups of all worlds moved along the moving corridors. Others loitered in the small overhead transporter tunnels. Some relaxed in lounges and trading stations until they could catch interstellar connection starships and local transports.

Selerael felt overwhelmed by the density of living beings in the confining space and decided to head down the moving corridor past the main passenger holding area and into a less-traveled section of the upper levels. There she was suddenly distracted by something she saw away on her right and hopped off of the moving corridor.

Standing under the holofield that identified the many holding areas, she stared up at the sign that marked the holding cell for the two grounded ships Narae and Hernendor.

She started laughing, but the people around her only stopped to look at her a moment, eyeing her as though she were quite strange.

For a long time she lingered under the sign, when two men and a woman passed by her in a hurry and almost ran into her; they seemed to be heading into the restricted access corridor, and they were headed there without hesitation. Ahead the trio halted, and the man at the head of the group turned around to speak with the others, his features lit up as he stood under the dim lighting of the corridor.

Selerael heart her heartbeats quickening.

Fynals Hinev! The man she had longed to contact for so many long years in the times of her greatest loneliness, of all people the one being with whose destiny she dared not interfere.

He was Adam's descendent, her descendent, a descendent of Alessia, the very child he had raised, but he had never even known it. And her own mother, Alessia, had never known it.

Only Selerael had known, these many long years.

Oh, how much she wanted to speak with him, to comfort him, to ease his suffering and her own with one brief moment of human contact—with the only human being who understood how much she had suffered eternally estranged from the life around her.

Selerael stared in open wonder, her eyes focusing on the face of the man with dark hair and violet eyes. For many long years she had avoided him intentionally, but in the end, Fynals Hinev had slipped silently past her and not noticed her at all.

Selerael had often wondered why she had not been affected by the same multi-personality that plagued Hinev, but perhaps it was Alessia's memories, and the memories of the other explorers she had carried, that had saved her from the mental isolation that had affected Hinev. Or perhaps it was also her own memories of her time on Earth that had saved her—she didn't know.

As she stared at Hinev, he seemed to have become aware of a presence in the room that was different from any of the others. He stopped, or rather, his mind stilled to listen, even as his body went through the motions, even as he outwardly listened to his companions Mirako and Gian.

A moment later, the half-race face finished his conversation with his companions and peered back into the main thoroughfare to check for regulators. Selerael hurriedly pulled out of view and stood in the shadows with a desire to look back growing irresistibly in her mind. After several moments, she heard the sudden sound of distant laughter. She turned back to inspect the corridor, and found a pair of alarming violet eyes searching deep into her own.

Hinev's eyes flickered, his brows drawing together in an expression of contemplation. Then there was a great calm. Hinev wouldn't let go of her eyes; he was staring at her in wonderment, growing wonderment.

He knew exactly who she was.

And know also knew of the time-loop; that he was a descendant of Alessia.

"Hinev?" Mirako asked, drawing his gaze for a moment. When he turned back to the corridor, the Enorian woman was gone.

A light smile played on Hinev's lips.

Alessia—

"So why do you want Attorea?" Mirako demanded. "That ship's not fit for anything but cargo these days."

Hinev looked to her; he found himself wondering if the Enorian woman was eavesdropping as he answered.

"I won't argue with you, Mirako. After I set the mechanized navigation, you'll take the Narae and Gian will take the Hernendor. I'll distract the Council by taking Attorea and follow you in a few hours. You two can begin to load our people on board the two ships while I arrange a communication with Marankeil. If he grants us permission to leave, Attorea and I will see you above Seynorynael, just outside the magnetosphere. If the Emperor refuses to let us go, then I'll send you a signal to go on without me. Narae and Hernendor will continue on course to the Rigell system, and I'll stay with Attorea to distract the Grand Fleet and meet you later on the way."

"I still don't like it," Mirako mumbled. "Too many ifs and chances, if you ask me."

"There's nothing else we can do," Gian reminded her.

"Wait, Hinev, is the Attorea capable of relativistic travel?" Mirako suddenly thought to ask.

"Don't worry, Mirako." Hinev laughed, but his laugh seemed empty. "Everything is going to turn out for the best."

Selerael waited, but heard nothing more. Hinev and his companions had passed through the security doors and out of her reach.

Marankeil had been lounging on the Imperial Throne as he argued over the communications network with Hinev. Hinev kept entreating the Emperor to allow the Celestian colony to colonize the Rigell system, and Marankeil had refused just to spite him, yet they continued to press the issue, and now, Hinev had involved Hinev's explorers on the other side of his communications sphere.

Then, against all expectations, the half-race man abruptly cut off communication!

Marankeil felt a current of red-hot rage igniting within him but managed to keep his composure, even though there was no one present in the Throne Room. Hours passed, and he summoned his Praetorian Guard to the Throne Room in case Hinev made an appearance there; at the same time, Marankeil heard reports that the half-race man had stolen Attorea, as well as the Narae and Hernendor.

Another hour passed, until the Martial Force legionary finally brought word that Narae and Hernendor were both within range of the Velastria II's main anti-matter weapons.

The captain of the Velastria II waited obediently, his head bowed in the relayed image of the holo-sphere. At a word from the Emperor, the Velastria II would blast the renegade crew of the Narae and Hernendor out of the sky, not to mention the Attorea that had yet to rendezvous with the others.

Marankeil was, however, already preoccupied listening to the communications between Hinev and his Celestian colonists that The Imperial Palace had intercepted.

Then it seemed Marankeil had tired of listening to the messages. The crew of the Velastria II watched the transmissions from the Emperor; Marankeil stood, his finger pointing lazily in mid-air, his elbow bent, as though poised in contemplation on how best to order the Celestian colonists' annihilation.

"Message from the Hernendor to Attorea. Come in Attorea," the transmission sphere of the Imperial Throne Room picked up the random, blurred vidigital communication coming from Hernendor. In a moment, the solemn voice began to use prosaic vernacular; apparently the Celestian colonist shifting about at his communications console wasn't really familiar with established military protocol. "Do you read us, Hinev?" he asked. Gian wants to know your present coordinates—Hinev? Come in Attorea, this is communications specialist Erlenkov, trying to reach Fynals Hinev..."

"Emperor Marankeil?" one of the regulators said; the clone form of Marankeil had suddenly turned pale.

Erlenkov...

"Where is Ornenkai?!" Marankeil bellowed suddenly. Did he need Ornenkai to be near?

"I don't—"

"Find him!" Marankeil said, his eyes frozen, intent upon the image of the Celestian refugees manning the bridge of the Hernendor. He peered closer, watching every slight movement of the man in the communications chair, this oblivious, gesturing creature, this man who called himself Erlenkov.

"Sir, Ornenkai is nowhere to be found." One of the other Martial Force officers informed the Emperor, cringing in case the Emperor decided to punish the bearer of displeasing news. "His signal is inactive at this moment."

Marankeil stood silent a moment, but made no move against the officer who had spoken. The Emperor was still looking at the relayed image of the bridge of the Hernendor. There was but a moment to destroy the ship and the other traveling just beyond, or else the Martial Force would be obliged to send out a legion of cruisers if they hoped to catch and destroy the fleeing refugees. There was but one moment to make a decision, and the officers of the Grand Fleet waited for the word of authorization to obliterate the refugees.

"Let them go," Marankeil said quietly.

"What?" the officer protested for only a moment before realizing what he had done; he threw himself to the floor in horror, hoping against hope that the Emperor would be merciful and not have him tortured and executed in a public spectacle for questioning an Imperial command.

But the Emperor Marankeil just turned and walked away.

And the Hernendor and the Narae continued unimpeded on their course for the Rigell system.

As the transport for Maerus' third moon launched, a commotion of signals disrupted the activities on board the vessel Shiran. The news that three renegade vessels had left the Celestian colony for the old lai-nen sector had the thousand passengers on board rushing to the observation windows for a glimpse of the starships. The blue-white globe of Seynorynael still filled the viewport, surrounded by the heavy traffic of satellites, space stations, and millions of ships coming in and out near the Seynorynaelian centipede gates.

But Selerael saw the crash in the distance, a small short-lived blast into silence as the oxygen within Hinev's ship Attorea was swallowed by the near-vacuum and dispersed into the void.

Undina, Reneja... the ghosts whispered, but of all on board the Shiran, Selerael was the only one who heard them.

Selerael closed her eyes to shut herself off from the intrusive reality around her. The world was empty, all emptiness to her now.

Now that Fynals Hinev was dead.

It was whispered throughout the Empire, that upon the sudden death of the Vice-Emperor, Rilien Kilaen Ornenkai, in the year 14.693 L.I.I., the Emperor Marankeil wept openly before the Imperial Advisory Council for the first time that had ever been recorded in the long annals of history.

Some tendays later, perhaps a decade sooner than planned, Emperor Marankeil embraced the mechanized unit as his sole entity, and then had the ashes of his clone form buried in the Seynorynaelian Arboretum.

Chapter Fifteen

In the thousands of years while she was absent from Seynorynael, Selerael heard news of environmental and transportation disasters on her home world, the beginnings of what many off-worlders predicted to be the decline of the Seynorynaelian Empire, though to be sure, as far as the closest planetary territories were concerned, it didn't seem that the Emperor's control over his subjects had suffered in the least.

The outlying territories in galaxy group six had begun to consider themselves lucky that they escaped the most severe political abuses inflicted on nearer territories, though the speed of star gate travel kept them from enjoying too many freedoms. During Selerael's journey to Gwardichardarii, she heard news that the Grand Fleet had been sent to the neighboring Kopran system to impose a severe tax on the metal mining industry. A short-lived riot had broken out, resulting in the termination of more than eighty-five thousand high-ranking Koprantes by imperial officials, who promptly replaced the industry chiefs with off-world experts they had already planned on putting in charge.

Many of the regions had begun to suffer under the strict centralized control of Seynorynael, its indifference to regional concerns, and vain love of collecting intergalactic luxuries. On her way home after nearly fifteen thousand years, Selerael traveled back to some of the worlds in the second galaxy group that had become wasteland since her last interplanetary stop in the area.

The complete depletion of natural resources and Imperial retaliation against revolts had left lifeless, barren planets across the galaxy group—but those worlds had been fortunate. Depleted and rebellious planets that no longer served a useful purpose for interplanetary travel had simply been abandoned by the Empire to survive on their own.

Many worlds were left barren and unable to support life any more.

Ralsin, once called "Aralsynai" teemed with life despite the harsh conduct codes imposed throughout the Seynorynaelian Empire, now called the "Sinanailian Empire". But the city was not the great center of culture it had once been. Technology and culture seemed to have stagnated, if not entirely regressed since the Empire's founding. The population that had once valued self-sufficiency, hard work, and well-rounded education had divided society into two categories: a small class of educated elite loyal to the Emperor and their own comforts, and the large mass of the population that somewhere down the line had begun to believe that self-improvement was vanity.

It didn't take long for Selerael to discover that Firien City, Kerrai, and Kilkor had been demolished down to the last stone, their inhabitants perhaps relocated by command, or else by the necessity of the last great ice whirlwind. The very past existence of the cities had disappeared from living memory, and the transports no longer ran anywhere near those areas.

Kilkor had been inundated by sands; Kerrai, now called Krai and still ideally located just a ways northwest of Ralsin, had been mined and the rugged, mountainous land reshaped and flattened beyond recognition, until the Advisory Council turned it into the sight of the Sinanailian Waste Project, where planetary garbage might be sorted for combustion, restructuring, and recycling. The smell didn't quite make it all the way to Ralsin, which had grown to the point that an even larger new dome had to be constructed around the city, but even if the grey "Krai clouds" passed over, Ralsin was safe from the stench within its orderly dome.

The population of Sinanail was now severely restricted to the city domes; many had never seen the mountains and lakes of their home world and didn't even know that such natural phenomena existed on Sinanail. Thankfully, the Sinanalians at least seemed content with urban life.

Lake Firien—what was that?

This was the usual answer the merchants got when they stopped to ask for directions anywhere around or on Sinanail. The Firien province, called the "Firn" province, was still frequented by authorized traders to the mechanized production plants that had been built there, production plants that scoured the land for rare minerals and plants found only in the Firn province. Despite the limited transports to the area, Selerael's last visit to Firien was on foot; she didn't worry about the satellite systems spotting her and reporting her for unauthorized activities. She arrived in Firien as nothing more than a shadow that had traveled alone across the southern hills.

When she reached Lake Firien, she wished she hadn't come.

The once silver mirror of Firien's crystal waters were murky black and gave off a putrid stench that didn't get any better when it grew colder, and grew positively unbearable when the wind stirred and rapidly suffocated the shore with the heavy, clinging smell.

As Selerael walked along the shore in the changewinds, picking her way over slimy green boulders, no kiri bird sang. The eternal sound of the waves whispered weakly to her. The pebbled shore of purplish-blue stones was riddled with ancient trash, mostly indestructible chordent materials washed up to the shore and products and materials left behind by the production plants and by the merchant traders.

From the shoreline, she could already see that the lyra forest had gone. A few lonely lyra trees, too small to have been of use as construction wood, remained in the great hills that had been home to the Seynorynaelian forest, some with trunks half charred black.

Selerael made her way up the shoreline to her mother's ancient home, now only an empty field where not even grass would grow, the bright white sand shining here and there among the filth in the intense light of Valeria. She searched the naked fields until she found a lyra still standing—a forlorn sapling that had never reached maturity—under the shade of closer trees once grown as an ideal source of paper and resins; touching the smooth bark of the lyra brought a vision of the last destruction to her mind.

She leaned against the trunk of the tree and felt nothing at all.

"Who is that woman?" Regulator Nerranse sat down in the officer's lounge as he came in from his patrol of Ralsin's northeast sector. The other regulators had stopped to watch the transmission in the holo-monitor, where a young lovely woman with a charming voice was speaking—he thought she looked different in t a world where everyone had been grown to appear aesthetically pleasing for aeons.

The strange woman wore the labcoat of an Imperial scientist, but after a moment, Nerranse realized that what she was saying wasn't normal, and that she wasn't like any scientist he'd ever heard.

On Sinanail there were only a few professions a person had to choose from, it they chose to work at all, since the humanroids took care of everyone. Merchants were drawn to trade for additional wealth, regulators had controlling tendencies and organizational urges, military officers were generally drawn to the occupation by hereditary titles and honorary commissions, and they struggled dutifully to combat the hordes of invading insurrectionists from the fringes of the Imperial territories, and last of all came the scientists—well, the scientists were the do-gooders.

As far as Nerranse knew, those were pretty much all the possible occupations there were. Everyone had all they needed to live, and all they could possibly want; there wasn't any reason to do anything. People lived a good five hundred years, too, which wasn't half bad, and spent most of their time engaging in sexual relationships, real or visually simulated, and engaging in other pleasant activities.

Children—of course no one wanted any, and no one had to have any, because the population was already big enough, but when and if it started to dwindle, there was always the government ectogenesis labs, and since everyone had been raised by a humanroid, there weren't any troublesome parent-child relationships to spend the rest of one's life being resentful about.

Honestly, Nerranse had a hard time understanding the ancients whenever he read about their strange and unusually self-torturing habits and ideas. Not that he read very much, or rather, listened to recordings of literature. Some did.

Nerranse momentarily had such a hard time following the woman in the monitor, but not because of her voice. In fact, her language and accent were perfectly comprehensible. It was just his own momentary lack of interest.

Then after a moment staring at her in wonder with his friends among the regulators, Nerranse summoned his powers of concentration and listened to the woman a moment. Now she was openly suggesting that the entire population should leave the planet—but her line of argument was what had fascinated the regulators. She was talking about something they knew little about, the supernova of Vlria—their star. "We can't expect to keep Sinanail alive forever. We must move on and adapt to a new life, a natural life. Sinanail's glory has faded. The supernova of Vlria is imminent, but our society has already begun to wither.

"We have only one choice to save ourselves. We must accept our fate and leave our home as our ancestors did or face the unpredictable nova that will destroy this system. To keep our people alive, we must find another home and begin again."

Nerranse joined the general laughter that erupted when the scientist finished her speech.

If Sinanail was going to be destroyed, then the humanroids would warn them in plenty of time that they had to leave the planet. And if that wasn't going to happen any time soon, Nerranse didn't want to hear anything more about it.

So, Alessia, you have returned, he thought, laughing inwardly, watching the woman who claimed to be a scientist called Selerael. He continued to stare at the frozen image in the frame through the mechanized eyes, but her disguise did not fool him.

Her choice of words had betrayed her—they showed him who she was. She could be no one else but Alessia, the Alessia of the future, now returned to his past to try to destroy him. Marankeil wondered if perhaps she was confused that he had not bothered to stop or censure her many broadcasts these past several years. But he had been expecting her to appear for quite some time.

Such foolishness, he thought complacently. Surely she must know that we have plans to escape. I wonder if she thinks that people will listen to her, but who is she to them? —I have convinced the people that they will be safe, that we will warn them of the supernova.

Yes, Alessia, our people shall depart together as the Enorians left their world, but where they failed we will keep our race, the Empire, strong and unified. No one will attack us if we don't divide and panic in our attempt to flee the disaster that might be the end of Seynorynael. But I will move the entire planet itself to another system before I see my Empire crumble.

Alessia thinks that because she is half-Enorian that she can foresee the future for our people, Marankeil thought in irritation. But she would destroy our Empire. That will never happen. I will leave when I am ready to do so—when I have prepared where I will go, when I have built a new Imperial intergalactic center. We have five thousand years remaining. Enough time to establish a firm hold in another system.

Why should I fear her now, if this was all the threat that the explorers' singularity of Kiel3 was able to bring against me? If the future holds no further threat than Alessia's feeble warning, there is nothing to fear.

In six hundred years, Selerael had grown tired of the broadcasts. She would have given them up if she could only let go of the hope that she would reach some of the people, but in time her transmissions had become a form of amusement to the city of Ralsin and its many visitors from the off-worlds. Most of the population had ceased listening to her message and spent the time speculating on whether or not the woman in the transmission sphere was an artificial humanroid mechanized unit or clone incarnations of an actual Imperial scientist.

Some people had begun to quote the woman of the messages as an object of popular humor, but the warnings of Sinanail's impending destruction were surely premature.

Selerael had recently begun to consider creating escape ships on her own for the children of Sinanail and the few groups that had taken her message seriously. Her mother's memories made it unlikely that such an attempt at rescue had succeeded in the aftermath of the destruction of Sinanail, but Alessia hadn't known all that happened after the supernova. Perhaps, Selerael thought, perhaps her own rescue plan had been successfully carried out but had remained unknown in the chaos that ensued.

After six hundred years, Selerael had decided that she would make no more broadcasts. She had lived alone in the city during that time, escaping detection and recognition by living on the fringes of the city in the darker ground level streets until she could bear the loneliness no longer. Like Hinev and her mother before her, she required no food or sleep to maintain her life, but lived day to day as a wanderer.

Life was an endless dream to her. As she lay on the bare ground under the bright light of an artificial street light in an abandoned transport tunnel, she thought suddenly of her mother the way she had looked on Tiasenne in Selerael's early years of life. The thought brought back her own memories of that time when she had lived on Selesta with her mother, Kesney, and Klimyata Fulten-Mira.

Why—after so long, was she permitting herself to think of Alessia?

Selerael sat upright suddenly. Of course. Her mother's physical entity was again nearby! And that meant—

At last it had begun.

Instead of panic and fear, she felt a great sense of relief, and calm.

Would it all be over soon?

For the first time she wondered if the Enorians' escape from their own dimension, if entering into an alien universe, had disrupted the conservation law of mass and energy—her Enorian soul would ever be called back from the constrainment of the physical burden to another time and place despite the serum—back to a remnant of Enor, the paradise of Laina Eilen frozen beyond time and existence.

As she watched the darkened world around her preparing for evening, she could not help but pity the unsuspecting planet that had been over-confident in humanity's ability to predict the uncertain future.

Twilight had just fallen for the last time on the planet Seynorynael.

Valeria, the blue star of Seynorynael, was about to supernova a thousand years before anyone ever expected. And the planet Seynorynael would be eaten by Valeria's violent eruption into space.

In the quiet moment just after star's-rise, Selerael felt the distant gravitational shockwave pass through her. Her first thought was to try to ensure that the population could escape, to try to get them to the few escape ships spread across the planet, but there wasn't enough time to save them all.

She decided not to try. There was no longer anything she could do to save their civilization.

Closing her eyes, Selerael made a quick mental change in plan for a short stop along the way, and then dissolved her own body into energy.

Moments later, Selerael re-materialized in a corridor inside the council building of the Imperial Palace, directly in front of the Main Terminus in the lower levels of the interconnected governmental nexus.

When she stepped into the council room, she saw the chaos. The mechanized Elders were frantically trying to activate their own escape ship. Of course they had once anticipated the possibility of Seynorynael's premature destruction. Thus they had built an escape vessel into the very building itself, from the vaults deep beneath the building up through the council room to the impenetrable canopy of the Imperial dome.

They never expected to be interrupted at that moment.

The Elders paused briefly to consider the humanoid intruder that had appeared suddenly in their midst, their dark, inhuman facades regarding her coldly.

"It's no use. You aren't going anywhere." Selerael announced in the language of the ancients.

The Elders didn't pause at all in their activities.

"You can't control what is meant to be." Selerael said, loudly this time. "You are all fated to die with me. And I am here at long last to make sure that you do."

The Elders were not moved. They continued to scramble around, setting commands into motion, all to prepare their escape vessel.

Only the Emperor himself spared a moment to respond to the intruder.

"You are mistaken." Marankeil laughed, protectively eyeing the confining perimeters of the Main Terminus. "We are ready to escape Seynorynael, Alessia. As I told you once before, though we may be caught off guard, we will endure." Marankeil told her. "We knew this day was coming, even if it came earlier than expected. And we knew you would try to stop us. You do at last remember our interviews?"

She glared at him; he took her expression as a sign that she had somehow been able to remember.

"Such a treat," he laughed. "I'm glad you know. I often thought it would give me pleasure if you knew how much I had broken you, Alessia. Remember how I told you long ago that you would fail? We prepared escape ships—we had them even then, you know. And if you don't leave Seynorynael now, you'll perish along with the people of this planet. You had better stop now, and I may be kind and allow you to find your way to another escape vessel. If you do not, I will hold you on the surface until I leave, until it is too late; yes, I'll hold you with the frequency I programmed into your mind before Hinev ever gave you the serum."

"You wouldn't."

"I would." He laughed. "Poor Alessia, were you gone all this time trying to find that mythical Enorian singularity?" Marankeil said sardonically. "Poor thing, you haven't learned yet. There is no such thing—only a myth. Myth is fantasy, and legend is only self-fulfilling prophecy. I thought once perhaps there was truth to it all, but certainly now you must know that there is no Enorian singularity. Even if there was one, and if you had used it to get here, it would do you no good. You can't act while I control your mind.

"Ornenkai was a fool to allow you to believe it was possible to alter the past. He knew what I had done to you, but perhaps he thought the singularity would give you control over me—but what can it do? How can the singularity or going into the past give you any real power over me?" He laughed, regarding her as though she posed no further threat to him; Selerael felt the power of his presence and found herself being willed into submission, felt the pressure against her mind urging her to waver, to turn back, to give up.

He seemed to be enjoying the exercise immensely.

He didn't know how very wrong he was—yet.

She paused only a few moments longer. She knew she was going to have to use her mindforce to keep them there, to keep them from moving. Did that mean that she had controlled the singularity since she came to Earth? Was there ever truly a physical singularity or had Marankeil and Ornenkai misinterpreted the meaning of the Enorian legend, presuming they understood that language well enough to decipher it?

Perhaps there was no singularity from Kiel3—unless, as the colonizer had said—

She wasn't a human being but the singularity itself, or whatever that miscopied or misinterpreted word might have been, a creature born of Time and Space—

Perhaps she really was a singularity, only using this semblance of physical form—born of energy, and not of matter—

After all, wasn't it impossible for Hinev's explorers to have a child of their own? Wasn't her existence impossible, because to leave no trace of their own lives behind had been part of the price they had to pay for their immortality?

A hailing siren interrupted Selerael's thoughts.

Meanwhile, Marankeil's council had finished the launch preparations, and the Imperial Fleet that called to them for instructions waited for a response.

Selerael would not let him go. She had waited an eternity, suffered through years unending for this moment, to stop them, and she would not fail!

She stepped forward without a word, feeling the combined energy of her cells coalescing into a tangible force and began to gather the semi-sentient waves in her mind.

As she moved towards the Elders, a great telekinetic wave burst forward from her, the recoil shock of the force pushing her back a step.

Marankeil's mechanized speaker ceased, and the power to the holo-monitor where he had been about to send his response cut off. Under the pressure of the mental energy brought to bear against him, Marankeil managed a slow grinding step towards her, but Selerael's energy retaliated, increasing its concentration against him to hold him powerless.

The Emperor's eyes stared at her in uncomprehending fury. Then they narrowed mockingly, and she was aware of his thoughts. He would summon the frequency to stop her; he would bring her to her knees before him.

In a moment of panic, he saw his mistake.

He struggled with the concept a long, very long moment.

The time-loop he had thought to escape was inevitable. And whoever this woman was, she wasn't Alessia— If it was never Alessia who was going to return to the past, but then—who was she? Not Alessia? Who, and how—

"No, I'm not Alessia, Marankeil." Selerael said. "But you believed you had stopped my mother by programming her mind before the serum to respond to the frequency, that I—she—hadn't been able to confront you all of these years because of her programming?"

Marankeil's eyes laughed at her. Well, well! Alessia's daughter! No wonder that when I saw her I presumed she was Alessia. Hinev lied to me— or else he was mistaken. He lied about the price of immortality when he said none of the explorers could have children.

"Yes, I tried to ensure Alessia's unwitting cooperation through mind control." Marankeil admitted. "I was certain I could control her. I was certain she couldn't stop me. But Alessia's daughter or not, it doesn't matter," he dismissed her triumph. "Your actions are futile. Don't you know that I will endure? I have seen to it that my entity lives throughout my Empire. I will return again."

Selerael's slow smile should have warned him to be afraid.

He mistook it for naiveté.

"No, I've taken care of that already," she said firmly.

"You think so?" Marankeil's eyes still laughed at her.

His certainty that he had foreseen this obstacle, that he had a trick up his sleeve that still kept him safe from her power annoyed Selerael—but he thought he had won by duplicating his mechanized form.

Now it was Selerael's turn. She saw the other Elders watching the interchange, wondering what the new look of victory on the face of Alessia's daughter might mean.

She decided to toy with them all no longer, and projected one clear memory to them all.

There she was—destroying the last of them. The last of—what?

In the last few thousands of years, she had made a journey to each of the off-worlds holding his mechanized back-up units and destroyed his memories. They were as soulless as the first creation he had made before breathing his own life into its form.

Selerael's last visit had been only moments ago. When she appeared in the Main Terminus, she had only just materialized from the Imperial ship above the planet, where in the chaos of fleeing vessels, she had reprogrammed the last of the mechanized units. When the Grand Fleet attempted to resurrect their Emperor to protect themselves in the aftermath of the Empire's collapse, they would find only a unit specialized for gardening.

Behind Marankeil's fury was a pang of disbelief and a sharp wound of despair in the knowledge that Ornenkai, Riliya his childhood friend, had betrayed him.

And that betrayal would now destroy him.

Yes, Marankeil, in this Ornenkai will atone for his past sins, but you will not see that future.

"You can't!" Marankeil ordered; he was used to his orders being obeyed.

"Marankeil, why do you want to live forever?" Selerael asked calmly. "What are you living for, except to spread the same misery to others that you carry within you?"

"I live because I want to live." He replied.

"You want to survive?"

"Yes. Isn't that what we all want?" He said, looking for any possible way to entrap her and to escape.

"Yes," she admitted reluctantly, "but I want something else more than that."

"What?" She had his attention again.

"I want to save the world."

"Save the world?" He echoed, with a trace of surprise. "From me?"

"Yes—from you. And I am going to save you, Marankeil, because no one deserves to have to live forever in this world."

"I think I don't want your kind of help."

"But I must—I will help you."

Marankeil moved back, his mechanical eyes now peering at her closely, very, very closely. If he had still possessed a heart, his heartbeat would have been racing.

"Who are you?" he demanded, his voice low.

"You asked me that once before, and I couldn't answer you." She said. "But I can answer you now. I am Selerael, child of the Zariqua Enassa, and the one destined—to kill you."

The silence stretched. Then, suddenly, Marankeil's eyes widened with an expression no mechanized being should have been capable of making.

"Elera," he said, his voice unable to dissemble the complete shock that engulfed him in response to this blow; he seemed suddenly to be looking past her. "Elera," he repeated, "I never would have thought it would be you. But you—you were the shadow all along, weren't you? The shadow that has followed me all my life." He seemed certain of this, so certain he didn't even need her to admit that it was true.

She faltered; she was at once aware of her posture, her small humanoid body standing alone before the ring of mechanized faces.

She held them there regardless.

Their Empire will die with me... she heard herself saying, far away, long ago.

Yet Marankeil also heard her words.

"Yes, Elera, we will die together," he said with a voice fully aware of the irony of his fate, a mechanical voice that sounded profoundly sad; they were Ilikan Marankeil's last words.

Selerael strengthened her grip on the distraught Elders' mind, but on Marankeil she had no need, she realized with wonder, and a sense of relief. He had stopped resisting her. As Marankeil began to abandon all hope of his own salvation, time seemed to lose meaning. The seconds passed slowly as in a surreal dream. The other Elders cringed, paralyzed by their fear.

As the memories of the mechanized units were fading into nothingness, Selerael became aware of an entity trapped within a capsule far beneath the Main Terminus, only now stirring to life again.

The original body of Marankeil, the vessel that still housed a part of his soul, even though he thought he had purged it of all life and sentience. Marankeil, like Ornenkai, had held on to his physical body and always kept it near, never suspecting to get rid of it would have been the only way to become an entire machine.

As the end neared, Selerael felt her anger and resentment against Marankeil fading. She tasted bitterness as though its acrid vapor filled the air.

Time was there behind Marankeil's form, there like a shadow perched on his shoulder, with its mocking grin.

The grin was fading...

She was no longer afraid of the eye of Time, and neither was Ilikan Marankeil.

The room was terribly quiet when the world suddenly fell out beneath them and quickly turned into energy and formlessness. Selerael heard the last terrorized shrieks of the mechanized elders, but instead of embracing death, her atoms began to turn into sentient energy as the light of the nova descended around them.

No! Her conscious protested the energy trying to keep her alive—she had never accepted the serum! She had nothing to be punished for!! She refused to be kept here alone, powerless, formless energy, now when she could see the face of Time turning into the beloved visage of loved ones she had not seen in more than fifty thousand years.

Then out of the void around her, she knew the answer. It was so simple—she was not a human being; she had chosen to make the journey into existence out of the energy of Time and Space, so now she might choose to return to that form—

She was not merely willing to die; she wanted the peace, to return to the light. This was the key to reclaiming her Enorian soul, to finding a way back to the tapestry of light where the souls of all the living lived on, far from the reality of the physical universe.

Yet the others—why hadn't she saved them? So many Seynorynaelians were doomed to die here with the end of their planet—of all the things she had tried to do to ensure their survival, none of her efforts had succeeded.

She tried not to stop torturing herself with the guilt of her failure; for was it not true what her mother had said long ago—the fate of the population wasn't hers to decide, and their lives were not her sole responsibility. She had done what she could to protect the future from the poisoned touch of the Seynorynaelian Empire.

And of the Enorians before them who had tampered with their lives.

Spirits were beckoning to her. As Selerael hovered between one dimension and another, she reached out around her to embrace the frightened people of her planet with her energy and go among them towards the vision and the people that urged her to join them on the other side of the dimensional barrier.

But as she reached the barrier itself, she turned to look back. Time stood still, she paused a moment, hesitating to release herself to that other world.

Behind her, she saw the Tiasenne of the present—her father's people, and outside the Valerian system, she saw Alessia on her journey to Celestian with the explorers, and a small flotilla of ships escaping from Sinanail—Seynorynael, on the tail of the Grand Fleet.

Then the present gave way to the future, and Selerael looked beyond the circle of time where her own entity had traveled, returning in a spirit that was everywhere at once to Kiel3, to the beloved Earth of her childhood. For a moment, she saw herself as a young girl there, growing up as events passed in quick succession, but she watched her own life as if a different being, and soon the future had dawned.

She went again to the Earth in the wake of the aliens' departure, and outside the window of a city dwelling, past the rising sun, towards a small girl who sat eating breakfast with her father and mother, a woman she knew; it was Moira Mathieson-Blair, her beloved adoptive Earth sister, and Moira's husband and child.

"Why do you suppose those aliens came and left us?" little Erin asked reading history from a picture book; the watcher knew the name of this child, knew it as one knows everything in a dream. "Why did that ship never come back?"

The mother laughed, but with a numb ache of a pain that had the power to hurt years after the event that caused it. "I don't know. Some things never have an answer."

"But why?" The child's eyes were moon-round; she refused to accept any simple explanation.

"Well perhaps they aren't meant to," Moira offered; her daughter wasn't satisfied.

"Don't you think things sometimes happen just because we think they're going to? Not because they're supposed to?"

Her parents laughed.

"I don't know, but think of all the things that happen that you or I will never know about. Some times people's roads cross, like yours and mine. Some say it is destiny. But I don't really know the answer, sweetheart."

Selerael left, passing by Moira with a lingering sweep of airy benevolence. As she soared away, she laughed and cried to herself.

Yes, Fate and Time hoard the answers, for they are not ours to know in this lifetime. But we will know someday, just as Zariqua Enassa said. I know the secret now.

Selerael looked away, and the Earth gave way to another planet on the other side of the ancient Empire's domain but equally tied into her destiny. The planet's future solidified, and she beheld New Tiasenne and its prosperity. Then one by one, the vision gave way to the hundreds of worlds that still existed beyond the Seynorynaelian time loop, and she knew that her civilization had not been forgotten, that a few of her people still lived, but the poisonous touch of Marankeil had left the galaxies.

And there he was far behind her when she turned about, the soul of Ilikan Marankeil, now but a hollow-eyed child, a moment later the young man she had come to know in the golden fields at Lunei.

He stared at her, in an instant that must have seemed forever forced to endure the horror of himself and what he had been; in that moment, she felt certain his soul had been immersed in the hell of understanding, of understanding the full effects of all he had done, the hell of knowing and regretting all that had been, for she herself also passed through that cathartic fire of knowledge; and then, after that eternal, suspended moment, the pain was gone.

The others were calling to her, and she heard their joyous voices grow louder ahead; she turned aside, waiting for Marankeil to catch up; and when at last he could pass through the void of fire and reach her, she knew that her purpose was finished, that she had saved him because even he was not beyond saving. Were not all the creatures of the universe but instruments of a larger force? And if that force should embrace them, was there any to say that even the least being was not deserving of returning to the tapestry of light?

As they reached each other, they felt a beautiful sense of conscious sleep descend upon them, a moment in which Time truly had been suspended, or perhaps expanded to infinity.

What were all their concerns to them now?

Before them, a great forest of lyra trees parted, and behind it the light revealed a gleaming city of tall white towers and a beauty that words alone would fail to convey. There Selerael felt the presence of all those whom she had loved on Earth: her mother, father, sister, and friends, and those whom she had loved throughout the galaxies, all waiting for her in the Enorian paradise, frozen forever in time, time that was a friend in this dimension, a jealous friend that had been waiting too long for her and for Ilikan Marankeil to return.

Selerael, the last child of Enor, had fulfilled her destiny, and found her way home.
Author's Note

On Seynorynael:

Because the planet Seynorynael was 109 kilometers from the star Valeria, five years passed on Seynorynael for every seven and a half Earth years.

Because Seynorynaelian seasons were so long, some animals lived and died only during a single season. Still others had adapted to live through many seasons and to tolerate the extreme, long cold season between the cooler periods. Cold weather dominated the life cycle so much that many Seynorynaelians thought of winter as a long unending cold season, and put all else aside to enjoy the brief summer. During dangerous periods the sudden thaw or early freeze threatened to push the planet into runaway glaciation or towards a runaway greenhouse effect. The people of the planet united at such times to carefully check an impending environmental disaster—-the danger they faced gave Seynorynaelians more respect for the awesome power of nature than any other civilization it later encountered.

Throughout the year, the oceans and rivers on the planet remained frozen in some places far to the north except for a brief period of time in the warm season. A few of the aquatic animals survived by shutting down their bodily systems into a kind of suspended animation as they froze within the waters, reacting to the change in temperature by secreting enzymes to revive themselves when the ice began to melt.

The Northern Ice sheets of Seynorynael reflected some of the heat and ultraviolet radiation of the blue-white star Valeria, but the animals of Seynorynael had made other adaptations to protect themselves from the sun's damaging rays. Scientists concluded that nocturnal life and creatures in the mid-depths of the ocean must have developed first because there they had been naturally protected from the radiation.

Then gradually, the animals of Seynorynael must have built defense mechanisms and migrated to land. The effects of the harsh environment were still evident in the fact that animals often had only one or two offspring at a time, their maturation rate was slow, and all life on the planet was longer-lived than the average animals encountered by their explorers. Not only were Seynorynaelian animals more hardy, but they were larger and more intelligent, as only the strongest, most innovative survived.

However, the constant fear of runaway glaciation or a runaway greenhouse effect gave most Seynorynaelians a fear of extremes and the belief that all one's actions held an invisible and potentially deadly consequence. If this belief made some of them cautious to the point of lethargic, it made others desperate to remove the pre-set conditions of their existence and to establish a new freedom of man over everything that bound his will: his environment, the source of his fears, his very mortality.

Dramatis Personae and places in Shadow of the Empire

Alessia Valeria Zadúmchov—Uh-LESS-ee-yuh Zuh-DOOM-chav—one of Hinev's explorers, daughter of the last Enorian Zariqua Enassa and Nerena Zadúmchov; the child taken by Marankeil to be Hinev's assistant

Ariyalsynai—Ar-ri-YAL-sinn-eye—"white mountain" or "star mountain"; the ancient capital of Seynorynael

Berrachai(y)i—Bair-uh-KAI-yi—an alien race

Calendra—Kuh-LEN-druh (soft "k")—a woman from Firien; Kiel's fiancée

Celekar Calain—SEL-i-kar Kal-LAIN (harder "s")—technician at The Firien Project; one of Hinev's explorers

Eiron Vaikyure-Erlenkov—AIR-on VAI-kyure ER-lenn-kahv—Selerael's father

Elera Erlenkov—ELL-err-uh ER-lenn-kahv—a woman training at the Lunei Center; Ilikan Marankeil's companion

Enor—EE-nor—a legendary planet and civilization

Ettrekh Meilacu-ra—EE-trekh May-LAK-ku-RAH—a Kayrian man, father of Undina

Fynals Hinev—FY-nahlss HAI-nev—the greatest scientist of Seynorynael, son of Jerekkil Hinev and Undina Meilacu-ra; the scientist who created the elixir of immortality known as "Hinev's serum"; one of Kudenka's explorers

Goeur—Gerr, like the French "coeur"—planet

Ilikan Marankeil—ILL-li-kahn MAIR-enn-kee-il—man who one day becomes a mechanized Elder, then Emperor of the Seynorynaelian Empire

Jerekkil Hinev—JAIR-ik-keel HAI-nev—an explorer and proto-telepath raised in the region of Lake Firien; father of Fynals Hinev

Fielikor Kiel—Fee-YEL-ee-kor Keel—a spacecraft engineer on The Firien Project; later the leader of Hinev's explorers

Firien—a city and region on Seynorynael surrounding Lake Firien; north of the weather-safe ring

Kudenka—Koo-DEN-kuh—a scientist who leads Kudenka's explorers; friend of Hinev

Lake Firien—Lake FEAR-ee-enn—a province of Seynorynael; also a large body of water

Lierva Kazankov—Lee-AIR-vuh KA-zan-kov—Major in the Martial Scientific Force in charge of The Firien Project; later one of Hinev's explorers

lyra—LEER-uh—the beautiful, mysteriously undying trees of Seynorynael; a formerly abundant, seeded, but now fruitless tree that can no longer be replaced once destroyed

Nalya—NAL-ee-yuh—young woman of the Ariyalsynai elite

Nerena—Ner-EE-nuh—daughter of Nalya and General Zadúmchov; mother of Alessia

Rigell—Rai-jehl—a white star

Rikhsehr Gerryls—RICK-zair GAIR-rilss—a botanist; one of Hinev's explorers

Rilien Ornenkai—RILL-ee-yen OR-nen-kai, a biochemist; later a mechanized Elder and then Vice-Emperor of the Seynorynaelian Empire; finally, the computerized entity on board Selesta

Selerael—Sel-AIR-ay-el (softer "s")—the daughter of Alessia and Eiron Vaikyure-Erlenkov, the one destined to end the Seynorynaelian Empire

Sesylendae—Ses-ILL-enn-day—starship of Kudenka's explorers

Seynorynael—Say-NOR-i-NAY-el; often Seh-nor-i-NAY-el—planet in the Great Cluster Galaxy

Selesta—Sye-lerr-ESS-tee-uh— the greatest explorer spaceship ever to be built by the Seynorynaelian Empire; once a ruin by Lake Firien, the vessel of the ferai-lunei, the comet riders.

Tiasenne—Tee-uh-SENN—planet in the Rega system

Tulor—Too-LORR—second planet discovered by Seynorynael

Undina Meilacu-ra—Un-DEE-nuh May-LAK-ku-RAH—young Kayrian woman; mother of Fynals Hinev; creator of the "science of individualism"

Valeria—Vuh-LAIR-ee-uh—blue star of Seynorynael

Zariqua Enassa—ZAIR-ee-kuh or ZAR-ee-kuh Ee-NASS-suh—last colonizer of Enor; Alessia's father

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