by David Weber
“Then they’ll just have to scream.” Gwendolyn shrugged. “Once we convince public opinion that the poor, aboriginal, barely sentient little savages need to be put on reservations to protect them from the corrupting influence of humans, we’re halfway home. We’ve got more than enough friends in Parliament to make sure the reservation boundaries get drawn in ways that don’t include any of the good land on Sphinx, Ozzie. And if we don’t—” she shrugged again “—Frampton and the others can always buy us some additional friends, now can’t they? Of course, it wouldn’t hurt a thing if we could also convince the big, bleeding-heart public that the little monsters are too dangerous to be allowed to run around loose where they might endanger children or other innocent bystanders, now would it?”
“No, it wouldn’t,” Morrow agreed around a fresh prickle of uneasiness. “Why? Have you got something in mind?”
“Oh, I think you might say that,” Gwendolyn replied with a small smile. “It’ll take a little time to set up, but I definitely have something in mind.”
* * *
Because he knew how nervous Stephanie was about speaking at the Adair Foundation banquet, Anders waited until he heard back from her about that to tell her about Duff DeWitt’s less than professional behavior toward the Pheriss kids.
When he did, her next message showed she took the incident as seriously as he and Jessica—and Mr. Pheriss—had. They’d messaged back and forth so often over the last several weeks—a lot more frequently than they had when he’d been the one on Manticore—that any early stiffness had vanished. Stephanie sprawled on her stomach on her bed, wearing shorts and a sleeveless top. Her head rested on her hands and she was kicking her bare feet up behind her. Lionheart rested nearby. The fact that the ’cat wasn’t sitting on Stephanie—as he certainly would have been if they’d been at home on Sphinx—reminded Anders that while it was autumn on this part of Sphinx, temperatures were much warmer on Manticore.
“Do you want me to see what anyone at the Adair Foundation knows about this DeWitt?” Stephanie was saying. “They didn’t select the team members, but they did vet their credentials. They may know something your dad and Dr. Nez don’t, and Gwen Adair seemed really nice. If there’s something going on that she doesn’t know about, I’m sure she’d be more than happy to help us get to the bottom of it. Let me know, okay?”
The rest of Stephanie’s message was mostly about classes. She was so busy she hadn’t even made it off campus except for the Foundation dinner.
“…Mom and Dad are coming out in about two weeks so they can have a holiday before they attend my graduation. They’re talking about extending their visit for another week or two so I can do some touring, but I don’t know…I really want to get home and see you and help with the x-a’s. We’ll see. I may not have a lot of choice in the matter.”
Anders considered Stephanie’s offer, then set up his reply. Knowing Stephanie would be eager to hear what he thought about her plan, he started in on that first thing.
“Let’s hold back on using the Adair Foundation until we see how DeWitt behaves. It’s been almost a week now, and he’s been a perfect angel. Jess and I asked Chris and Chet to keep an eye on him—or, I guess you could say, to keep an eye on whether or not he was staying with the rest of the x-a’s or off doing his own thing. They say he’s definitely staying with the herd. Maybe Dr. Radzinsky chewed him out after Mr. Pheriss got done talking to her. I hope so! It takes a special kind of slime-sucker to use kids that way.
“Hard to imagine you still have at least an entire month away—maybe more if your folks decide to take you touristing. Don’t miss the chance just for me, though. I was feeling too lonely and sorry for myself to really enjoy it when I was stuck on Manticore and you were stuck on Sphinx, but there are some really spectacular spots on that planet. If you get a chance to take one of the cruises on Jason Bay—not the air cruises, the water cruises—do it. You won’t be sorry, and there’s time. Dad said again the other night that we’ll definitely be here through autumn. For once, I’m so glad the seasons on Sphinx are fifteen T-months long.”
He chewed his lip for a moment. It was hard to be supportive when what he wanted most of all was to urge her to come back to Sphinx, but he resisted the impulse as unworthy.
“You look really cute in those shorts…I guess that’s one good thing about you taking that trip, Sphinx is so cool that even in summer I never would have had the pleasure if you’d stayed. Take care of yourself. Don’t study too hard. Give the fluffball a piece of celery for me. Hi to Karl…Miss you…Bye….”
* * *
Keen Eyes feared that the time of toleration had ended on the day Red Cliff disappeared.
Red Cliff had not been born to the Swaying Fronds Clan, but to a distant clan which lived where the rocks were a lovely sunset color. He had come to Swaying Fronds’ range many turnings before, drawn—or so he always said, and no one who had shared his thoughts had any reason to doubt the accuracy of this statement—by the most beautiful mind-glow he had ever sensed.
That mind-glow belonged to a young female of the Swaying Fronds Clan. In those days, she had not earned a name but was simply called “Speckles” for the pretty flecks of white that showed against her brown coat. Today, Speckles was called “Beautiful Mind,” in recognition both of the quality that had brought her a mate and for her undeniably warm and pleasant way with others. Together, Red Cliff and Beautiful Mind had raised several litters. The last had been born the previous spring and were showing themselves as fine a lot of scamperers as had ever delighted their parents and enriched their clan.
But those very scamperers where the reason Beautiful Mind was probably dying and Red Cliff was going slowly insane. When the fires had come, Swaying Fronds had done its best to get the weaker members to safety. The kittens had behaved with admirable composure, guided by the promise that if they passed through smaller flames they would escape the worst of the raging conflagration that was destroying their homes.
Then one little male had been hit by a flaming branch, breaking the hips of both his hand-feet and true-feet on that side. Beautiful Mind had sent her other kittens ahead, then raced back for the injured one. Lacking the dense oils that gave the older People some protection, the kitten’s fur had caught fire and his injuries had made it impossible for him to roll free of the flaming branch, much less smother the flames.
Beautiful Mind had thrown the branch clear, beat out the flames, and then attempted to carry the injured kitten clear, breathing in lung-scorching smoke all the while. The kitten had died in her arms. When Red Cliff raced back to pull her to safety, she was already far gone after her little one. Yet, despite her injuries, Beautiful Mind continued to draw ragged breath after ragged breath. Her mind was untouchable except in fragments, and those fragments mostly dreams of better days, but Keen Eyes wondered if she held onto life because she knew that without her Red Cliff would likely fade away. So many bonded pairs could not live without their partners. Sometimes a parent would survive if their kittens needed them, but Red Cliff’s bond to Beautiful Mind had always come first. He loved the kittens truly, but always because they were part of her.
When Keen Eyes returned to where the Landless Clan was currently camped near a stream that offered good water, he found Sour Belly fuming that Red Cliff was gone.
This was not good. A Person’s mind-voice carried a long distance, especially when seeking someone well-known. Clearly, Red Cliff had ventured further than was prudent or he was refusing to answer. Neither of those were promising.
A cough came from where Beautiful Mind lay. She was hardly more than a matted heap of brown and white fur, yet one true-hand rose and pointed, holding the position until Keen Eyes said ster. I will go after him. I will bring him back. I promise.>
But his heart moved uneasily within him, for Beautiful Mind had indicated the very heart of the territory held by Trees Enfolding Clan.
* * *
Anders had just finishing messaging Stephanie when his uni-link chimed. He glanced at the ID and took the call with real relief. Stephanie’s last message had been full of impending finals and her parents’ upcoming visit. Somehow, all her excitement had made her seem farther away than ever.
“Hey, Jess.”
“Hey, Anders. Listen. Mom’s asked me if I could do a favor for her. Tiddles isn’t feeling too well—”
Tiddles was Jessica’s youngest sister, a sturdy, determined three-year-old. Her given name was Tabitha, but Anders had never figured out where the nickname came from.
“—and Mom needs to take her to the doctor. Problem is, today is Mom’s day for recording plant growth in some of the burn areas, then collecting soil and plant samples. Timing’s really important with this. She asked if I thought I could handle it. I said I thought I could.”
Jessica sounded unusually nervous, and Anders thought he knew why. Naomi Pheriss was collaborating with Dr.Marjorie on a study of succession growth. The project was important for a lot of reasons—not all of them scientific. Dr. Marjorie had promised coauthorship to Mrs. Pheriss, which could mean a lot for future projects. The gang had gone along on a couple of Mrs. Pheriss’ collecting outings already, but they’d definitely been assistants, not in charge.
“Need company?”
“Seriously,” Jessica agreed. “I’m going to call the others, but I wanted to get you…Well, I mean, before you promised your dad you’d distract the x-a’s for him or carry buckets at the site or something.”
Anders laughed. “Honestly, I think Dad has me in mind for bucket duty. I was looking for an out. I’ll call you back if there are any problems, but otherwise you can count me in. Where should I meet you?”
“I can pick you up,” Jessica said. “Would you mind our leaving relatively early? We’re going to where the big fires were, up in the northeast Copperwalls.”
“No problem. See you then.”
* * *
When Jessica picked Anders up the next morning, he was surprised to see that—other than Valiant—she was alone. He’d figured she’d have at least grabbed Toby, since he didn’t live far from her in Twin Forks.
She saw him glance at the empty interior of her battered air car before he got into the front seat on the passenger side and, almost as if she was reading his mind, began to speak.
“Toby can’t make it. Today’s some special holy day for his family’s religion. Christine and Chet are on guard duty. I hope you don’t mind.”
Suddenly, Anders felt a touch shy. It wasn’t as if this was the first time he’d been alone with Jessica. And not only Jessica, but with her empathic treecat…He wondered why that should bother him.
He realized Jessica was staring at him, an expression of dismay spreading across her pretty features. He shook his head and hurried to answer her question.
“Mind? I don’t mind. Sorry. When I realized Chet and Toby weren’t going to be here, I tried to remember if I’d packed my handgun. We shouldn’t be out there, just the two of us, with no protection.”
“Do you need to go back for it?”
Anders made a pretense of checking his pack, even though he was absolutely certain he had the gun with him. He’d inspected it before coming down and made sure to put in a spare box of ammunition.
“I’ve got it,” he said.
“Great.” Jessica set the air car to rise. “I’ve never learned to shoot. I have a stun gun and a CS sprayer, but my dad is sort of into nonviolence. He doesn’t mind if I learn to defend myself. He even signed me up for an aikido class back on our last planet, but he says we should learn to defend ourselves without turning into our own enemy.”
“Tell that to the hexapumas,” Anders said. “Somehow I doubt they’d see it that way—or that CS would stop them. A stun gun, maybe, on full power, if you hit exactly the right spot.”
“Yeah,” Jessica said. “Stephanie says the same thing. Since I usually went hiking with her and Karl—and they’re always carrying some sort of shooting thing, sometimes more than one—I figured I was safe enough. Anyhow, we’d probably just use our counter-grav to get out of the way.”
“Well,” Anders said. “I’m still glad I’ve learned to shoot. I’m not as accurate as Karl or Stephanie, but I think I could at least slow down something the size of a hexapuma.”
They were speeding over the green canopy. Twin Forks and its outliers had vanished, but the Northeastern Copperwall Mountains didn’t look a whole lot closer. Jessica set the autopilot and leaned back.
“Funny,” she said. “It was learning Stephanie was so good with a gun that made me pretty certain all the stories Trudy told me about Steph being nova violent must be right.”
“Stories?” Like any young man in love, Anders was eager to hear stories about his beloved’s life before he’d met her, even—or maybe even especially—those she wouldn’t be likely to tell herself. “Stephanie uncontrollably violent? You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Apparently,” Jessica said, “it’s true. I heard about it first from Trudy. When Stephanie first met the local kids, there was a fad on for catching critters for pets. Chipmunks were popular. They’re ground burrowers, about the size of a small dog, and though they can climb, they’re nowhere near as good at it as, say, a wood rat, so they’re not that hard to catch. Almost everyone in Trudy’s gang had at least one chipmunk for a pet, and Trudy had a near-otter and a couple of range bunnies, too.
“Anyhow, one day Stephanie came into Twin Forks with her folks, and they made the usual attempt to get Stephanie to play with some kids her own age. When she found out that the game was dressing chipmunks up in bandannas and hats, she went ballistic. She punched out a couple of kids, gave Trudy a bloody nose, and basically made herself really unpopular.”
Anders found himself laughing uncontrollably. He’d seen images of young Stephanie Harrington from long before he’d met her. Marjorie and Richard Harrington were very proud of their only child and numerous holos of her were displayed around their house. He had no trouble imagining the cute little urchin in those images walloping a bunch of kids because they’d dressed up their pets.
“Oh, boy. Great way to make friends and influence people!”
“For sure.” Jessica shared his laughter. “When I got to know Stephanie, I asked her if that had really happened. She admitted it had—and admitted that it had happened more than once before her folks gave up on making her socialize in anything but an organized group like the hang-gliding club.”
“I guess Trudy wouldn’t have wanted to admit that her gang got repeatedly assaulted,” Anders guessed. “Once makes Stephanie sound mean and out of control, but more than once—Well, it doesn’t exactly make Stephanie sound much better, but it makes Trudy and her friends sound like the limpest sort of lettuce leaves.”
“That’s what I think, too,” Jessica agreed. “I think Lionheart brings out the best in Stephanie—and there’s a lot of good there. She’s admitted that she finds it easier to hang on to her temper these days.”
“Does Valiant help you?” he asked, and Jessica considered.
“Not with my temper. I don’t really have one, like Stephanie does, I mean. I get cold mad, not hot mad. But Valiant does help me, I think. My family’s moved so many times that I’m good at making friends, but inside I’m really shy. Valiant is so confident I’m worth knowing that, these days, I find it easier to talk to people about big things, not just make small talk.”
“You mean you wouldn’t have talked like this about Stephanie before?”
“I might have,” Jessica said. “I mean, I know you care a lot about her and so do I. It’s not like I’m trashing her. I figure she’s probably told you some of this already.”
“She did tell me she ha
s a temper,” Anders admitted. “But she didn’t tell me about giving Trudy a bloody nose.”
“Oops!” Jessica giggled. “Still, I don’t think she’d mind your knowing. It’s not as if Trudy ever fooled you about the sort of manipulative bitch she really is. Trudy thinks there’s not a guy on the planet—maybe even in the whole system—who can resist her.”
“But she dates a doper like Stan Chang.” Anders shook his head. “I just don’t get it.”
“Figuring out other people’s relationships,” Jessica declared, “is impossible. I’m not sure anyone will ever construct a formula that will precisely explain why certain people fall for each other.”
Valiant reached over and patted her, so Anders knew she must be thinking about something specific, but before he could ask, she shifted the conversation, talking about how her parents had met—an unlikely courtship if ever there’d been one.
From there it was natural that they talked about her little brothers and sisters, about how much the whole family liked Sphinx. Anders wondered if Jessica thought talking about Stephanie might make him feel bad, if she was trying to save him pain. Even so, Stephanie’s name kept coming up. It was impossible not to talk about her since she’d become so deeply entwined in both of their lives since they’d each come to Sphinx.
Eventually, Jessica glanced at the navigation readout on the HUD.
“We’re getting close. I’m going to slow us down so I can be sure we don’t pass over the right areas. Mom’s trying to collect data on precisely the same plants, along with doing a more general study.”
“Right,” Anders said. “Bring us down, Captain. It’s time we went a’hunting the infant forms of Sphinxian super-gigantic plants.”
Jessica’s giggle wasn’t Stephanie’s but it sounded pretty good. It cut through the loneliness, reminding Anders that—no matter how far away his girl might be—he still had friends.
* * *
Keen Eyes raced through the netwood trees. Knowing how acutely aware of each other bonded pairs were, he’d set his course in the direction indicated by Beautiful Mind’s pointing finger. However, he kept his attention sharp for any other signs the Person he sought had come this way. He found precious few: fresh claw marks in the bark where Red Cliff had apparently leapt too far and had to grip in, a bit of shredded leaf, a patch of matted feathers. This last looked as if the hunter had sprung after a potential bit of prey and missed.
