Treecat Wars

When they landed, the girls made a fuss over the peck marks on his face. When Anders got a look at himself in Christine’s pocket mirror, he couldn’t argue. He looked pretty bad, with blood and streaks of what he thought was probably bird shit all over his face. The shit wasn’t restricted to his face, either. Neither were the feathers…Bits of down and longer wing feathers stuck to him, giving evidence of how violent the rock ravens had been in protecting their territory.

Anders plucked off one of the larger feathers and tilted it back and forth, noting how the colors shifted in the light through blues into browns.

“Well, I guess something good came out of this,” he said. “We can collect samples for the SFS biologists. Anyone got a small bag?”

Jessica said, “I’ll borrow from Valiant’s stash.”

On Sphinx, even kids knew how to plan in advance for emergencies. There was a first aid kit in Chet’s truck and another in Jessica’s car. Fresh water wasn’t a problem, either. Within a relatively short time, Anders was scrubbed off and had been deemed fit for action once more.

“Well,” Toby said philosophically, “at least now we know rock ravens will fight back. I wonder if that’s what Karl meant when he said we should keep clear of them?”

“Now you remember?” Anders retorted sarcastically.

“Hey,” Toby said with an eloquent shrug of his supple shoulders. “I thought he was just worried about the birds. You know how he and Stephanie are. Nature first.”

“You’ve got a point,” Anders agreed. “Now, how do I get that thing? Obviously, it’s not going to be as easy as just grabbing it. For some reason those idiot ravens have decided they want to keep it.”

“I wonder,” Jessica said, “if it’s the color. Stephanie picked it because it was close to the shade of those hexaflies you two saw here. I wonder if the rock ravens think that that’s the biggest stash of hexaflies they’ve ever seen and you want to swipe it.”

Anders laughed. “I bet you’re right. If they’re sight hunters, the color would mean more to them than the fact that Stephanie’s package is the wrong size and smell and all.”

“Hey, don’t be too hard on them,” Christine said. “After all, there were a lot of hexaflies here not long ago. They’ve got a lot of reason to hope.”

Chet nodded. “Color might be our answer. What if we waited until after dark? If the rock ravens are sight hunters, then it’s likely they bed down or roost or whatever it is birds do it at night.”

“That’s a good idea,” Anders said. “Do you think we need to tell the Harringtons? I mean, I’m not sure they’d like the idea of us cliff-diving after dark.”

“I wouldn’t bug them,” Jessica said. “Stephanie always says it’s better to not say anything if you think someone won’t like the truth. We’re pretty far from where they have their house. If we don’t show a light, we should be fine. We’ll wait until the rock ravens get quiet, then send someone—”

“Me!” Anders insisted when Toby looked all too ready to volunteer. “This is still my quest. Anyhow, I’ll just use the counter-grav to lower myself. No problem.”

“That’s what you said last time,” Toby grumbled, but he didn’t protest further.

* * *

This time the plan worked. The rock ravens even cooperated by retreating into neat little holes in the rock as soon as the light began to lose its brilliance. They peeped a bit as Anders drifted by, but seemed to feel no inclination to go after him.

Maybe they think I’m a condor owl or something, Anders thought. They know how to pick their battles. That’s really not a bad lesson to take away from this. Not a bad one at all.

* * *

“Wow, that’s amazing what happened with the rock ravens,” Stephanie told the pickup as she recorded her latest message to Anders. “I had no idea they’d react that way. Jess wrote me about what happened, and it sounds as if you were great—and not nearly as out-of-control as you made it sound when you messaged me last night.

“I’m really glad you and Jessica both like my idea about her serving as liaison. Jess said that she actually got the impression Chief Ranger Shelton was relieved when she—I mean Jess—volunteered to be interviewed and to let the xeno-anthropologists meet Valiant. You know how protective Irina is of Scott’s free time, but Chief Ranger Shelton isn’t the sort to assume that just because Jess is only fifteen she’s automatically available. And she and her family can sure use the stipend. I think it was a good move on your dad’s part to offer it.”

Stephanie sighed, thinking about how much she wished she didn’t have to delegate that particular job. She was glad Jessica would be able to supplement her family’s income, of course, but still….

“The coursework is just as intensive as we were warned. We weren’t even on planet two hours before a bunch of material for us to review was downloaded onto our uni-links.”

She went on to describe some of the material, which ranged from social customs to elementary forensics, with a lot of botany and zoology in the middle.

“—so then we got the full tour.” Stephanie giggled. “Poor Karl found out it’s even hotter here in Landing then he thought it’d be. I thought he was gonna melt right down in front of me, but even the air-conditioning’s set a lot higher here than it is back home! It’s rough on Lionheart, too, but I think dad’s right about how the ’cat shedding mechanism works. Lionheart’s been shedding like crazy ever since we got here, and it has to’ve been kicked off by the rise in temperature. My dorm room looks like a permanent blizzard from all the hair he’s lost! But the labs are nice, and the HD set up is a lot better than I thought it would be. I like my dorm room, too, even if I wish it was a little bigger. With all this space here on campus, you’d think they could give me more than one room! But I guess it’s really all Lionheart and I need.”

Lionheart jumped up onto the back of her chair as if summoned by the sound of his name and twitched his whiskers gravely into the pickup over her shoulder. She laughed and reached up to scratch him under the chin, then turned back to the message.

“I wish we could let him run around more on his own, but Dean Charterman—she’s Dean of Students for the University—made me promise I won’t let him out without me. She says it’s for his own protection, but I think she’s little worried about what sort of trouble he might get into…or cause.” She grimaced, then shrugged. “On the other hand, it might be she’s worried about contamination, too. I know some people’re still nervous about how freely we let humans move back and forth between planets here in the Star Kingdom, and I think some of them are afraid Lionheart might be carrying disease or parasites or something.”

Her expression made her opinion of that particular worry obvious, but then she shook her head with another grimace.

“I guess it shouldn’t be too surprising after the Plague and all,” she acknowledged, trying to be at least marginally fair about it. “But you’d think all of the screening and medical inspections they still have in force would help people get past it. It darned well ought to, anyway!”

She glowered, still scratching Lionheart’s chin, while she contemplated such benighted attitudes for a moment.

“We’ve met our professors,” she continued then. “Dr. Gleason’s officially only a department head, but my impression is that he pretty much runs the School of Forestry, and I don’t think he’s too happy to see us.” She snorted. “Seems downright determined to keep as far away from Lionheart as he can, too, which I think is just plain dumb. He’s supposed to be teaching forestry and he doesn’t even want to meet a treecat?” She snorted again, louder. “On the other hand, Dr. Flouret’s Chairman of the College of Criminology, and I’m pretty sure he’s one of the good guys. Seems to be an old friend of Dr. Hobbard’s, and he had some really nice things to say about Chief Shelton, too.”

She paused, not quite sure what to say next, and felt a sudden burning sensation behind her eyes. She knew how interested Anders was going to be in everything she just told him, but she didn’t want to tell him about it; she wanted to show him, because that would have meant he was right here on Manticore where she could!

She bit the inside of her lip for a moment, then drew a deep breath and made herself go on brightly.

“In the meantime, Karl and I have been checking out the dining hall. You know how much I love to eat, and, fortunately, there are quite a few Sphinxians here with the kind of metabolism I have. At least they’re not going to starve me between official meals! And besides that…”

She trailed off. Much as she wished she could somehow make Anders be there with her, she knew wishing wouldn’t make it happen. Instead, she went back to what was really bugging her.

“I was fascinated—okay, a bit horrified, too—to hear how much trouble you had retrieving the package from the rock ravens. I don’t think anything could go that wrong with the rest of it, at least I sure hope not…Message me every step, okay?”

She wanted to say more, to say how much more fun it would be if he was there with her, but she didn’t trust herself not to break down. Instead, she blew a kiss toward the pickup. “Miss you…Lots….”

* * *

Keen Eyes was deeply worried. Over the last span of days he had searched for somewhere his clan—renamed in the depths of his mind the Landless Clan—might go. Given the hostility displayed by Swimmer’s Scourge, Keen Eyes felt that the route into the low lands was unsafe. If he had his way, he would have taken the remnants of the clan into Bright Water’s territory and traded on that clan’s known liberality. However, the older People of his clan—sadly the majority among the survivors—held firm against this.

<Better we die to the last,> said old Sour Belly, who was both the most senior hunter and the best flintknapper in the clan, <than become corrupted by the two-legs as Bright Water has.>

That Sour Belly was long past his best hunting days meant nothing to him—no more than did the fact that his current name came from the fact that he was old enough that his digestion was not what it once had been. He viewed this infirmity as an indication of his extreme age, and extreme age as reason enough for his opinion to be better than anyone else’s.

Keen Eyes couldn’t agree, but, short of reducing the clan even further—and robbing it of its source of stone tools—he had no choice. If Wide Ears or one of the other memory singers had survived, she might have overruled the elders, but Tiny Choir was less than a turning old, far too young to be recognized as an adult, much less take over as the clan’s memory singer.

Keen Eyes was also crippled in his ability to press his opinion because, before the fires, he had been among the younger scouts. The fact that many of his elders, including his beloved teacher, had died seeking the routes that had enabled the clan to get at least the elderly and the kittens to safety, did Keen Eyes no favors now. He was now the most senior scout…but not—at least in the minds of those such as Sour Belly—because he had earned the rank, but because he had been too careful of his life to die.

The decision—if any decision could be said to have been made, rather than simply made necessary by the creeping advance of colder weather—was to shift down into the lowest parts of their range and hope for the best. Keen Eyes suspected that by the reasoning of the Trees Enfolding Clan they had already violated the boundaries of their territory, but, thus far, the intrusion had been tolerated. How much longer—or further—that intrusion would be tolerated, Keen Eyes could not guess.

He could only hope that this fragile period of grace would extend until he could find them a new home.

* * *

Although the gang offered to help Anders with the rest of his scavenger hunt, none of the other clues offered the same level of threat. Probably the most “dangerous” challenge was one that took Anders to the burned out island where Stephanie and the others had fought to save Valiant’s clan. However, the danger offered by the island was due more to people than to the environment. It shared a border with lands held by the Franchitti family—a family that believed animals were for hunting, shooting, and imprisoning rather than preserving. They’d already received several reprimands for abuse of flora and fauna alike. As a result, they’d become very guarded about who crossed their airspace.

But Anders carefully kept his air car within the boundaries of public lands and, although there might have been an annoyed Franchitti or two just waiting to warn him off, he gave them no justification to intervene.

His prize in the end was worth every minute of his effort, though—as he wrote to Stephanie—the hunt in itself was a present.

“It kept you near me,” he dictated, taking care with every word. “I could feel you there before me. Sometimes you seemed so close that I felt if I hurried just a little faster I’d glimpse you, be able to reach out and hold your hand.”

He wanted to say more, but it was harder to talk about how much you wanted to kiss your girl than it was to do it. Weird.

Stephanie’s present managed to be both romantic and practical—rather like the girl herself—a custom band for his new uni-link. She’d crafted it herself in her family’s workshop and had inscribed the band so that the words would nuzzle up against his wrist, “To Anders, from his Steph. The void between worlds cannot divide hearts.”

* * *

Dad grinned when Anders showed him the custom band.

“I can’t say I’m completely surprised,” he said, admiring the careful workmanship. “She did ask me what we were getting you. She’s quite a talented young lady. I certainly wish she were still on planet.”

Despite any other changes in attitude, Anders doubted that his father felt that way because he commiserated so deeply with his son’s emotional life, so he said, “Still upset about those touring anthropologists? Have you learned anything about them that will help you deal with them?”

“Not much,” Doctor Whitaker replied glumly. “It’s been twelve days now, but given the lags in inter-system communication, all we have to go on is what we brought with us and what the Manticorans had on file. Langston and I cross-referenced the information Sonura Hobard sent us against our own research libraries, of course.”

“And?”

“And if these are the people who wrote the articles we’ve turned up, then we don’t have any excuse not to offer them at least professional courtesy.

Anders understood why his dad had included that wistful “if these are the people.” Tennessee Bolgeo hadn’t been any of the things included in his academic credentials. However, it was too much to hope for the same thing to happen twice and save the Whitaker expedition from the interlopers.

“In fact,” Dad sighed, “we’d be idiots not to offer them a reasonable amount of access. Dr. Radzinsky is quite respected for her work on non-human intelligence. In my opinion, she’s a bit conservative, but it was too much to imagine she wouldn’t be interested in developments here.”

“She’s not the only one coming, though, is she?”

Dad shook his head. “Under other circumstances, I could actually enjoy meeting Gary Hidalgo. He shares my interest in archeo-anthropology. Mind you, I don’t agree with a lot of his conclusions, but he definitely knows his stuff. He feels very strongly about the preservation of indigenous cultures in an uncontaminated state, so I’m sure he’ll have fits over how the SFS has given some treecats knives and axes. He’s certainly going to be in favor of having them protected from interference.”

Anders didn’t think this sounded too bad. “Anyone else?”

“They’ve got a linguistics specialist coming, too.” Dad scowled. “I had Kesia Guyen check them out, and she immediately got the shakes. Apparently, this Russell Darrolyn is on the cutting edge of nonverbal communication studies.”

Anders felt a flash of worry. He knew Stephanie and Scott had been torn from the first as to whether or not it would be a good thing to have the treecats recognized as as intelligent as they were. Better for humans to get used to them, come to like them, before they had to face the undoubted threat another sentient species could offer to human interests.

“Still, a linguist is good, right?” he said. “I mean, Kesia hasn’t been able to find any evidence that the treecats use complex verbal communication. Maybe this Dr. Darrolyn will have some new insights.”

Doctor Whitaker made a “tcching” noise with his tongue. “I’m not so sure providing that sort of proof will be his aim. Kesia says this Darrolyn is positively ‘cranky’ on the subject of communication forms that don’t involve words lined up into neat sentences.”

“Huh? I thought you said he was a specialist in nonverbal communications?”

“He is. But, basically, Darrolyn is very limited as to what he’ll agree is a viable communications form. Kesia said she thinks he’d doubt that even he is communicating, except for the undeniable fact that he gets replies.”

Anders blinked. The very idea made his headache. He’d heard of specialists who were extremely careful, but this seemed like going to extremes. Still, on the good side, it didn’t look as if Dr. Darrolyn was going to immediately jump to the conclusion that because treecats were telempaths, they were also telepaths. In fact, it sounded as if Darrolyn would need to prove to himself that the ’cats were even telempathic, despite ample existing evidence.

“Anyone else?”

“No one as important,” Doctor Whitaker said, sounding just a little happier. “Of course, each of them has a hanger-on or two, but none of them have the same level of prestige.”

“Well, Dad, I’m sure you’ll manage just fine.”

“Still,” Doctor Whitaker said, I’m glad Ms. Pheriss volunteered to take over for Stephanie. Now she can waste her time talking to these people will I get on with my work.”

* * *

“So, Ms. Harrington,” Dr. Gleason said, regarding her with his head cocked to one side, “what can you tell me about picketwood?”

Gleason had brown hair and eyes, a slender build, and a fussy manner. He hadn’t said so in so many words, but Stephanie was pretty sure he didn’t think it had been a good idea to let a pair of “kids” jump the queue and use up two of the slots in the School of Forestry. Not that his classes were all that crowded, as far as she could see. There were only eighteen people in this lecture course, after all, including her and Karl. And she didn’t much like the way he emphasized “Ms.” whenever he spoke to her. She’d heard that patronizing tone from too many adults.

“Picketwood is the common name for any of at least six species of the genus Neo-ulmus Sphinx,” she replied, “although ‘ulmus’ is something of a misnomer applied by the original survey crew. It’s really not very much like an Old Terran elm; it’s more like a cross between an Old Earth Willow and a Beowulfan ash tree, when you come down to it. The most common species are gray picketwood, yellow-leaf picketwood, mountain picketwood, magnolia picketwood, and narrow-leaf picketwood. They differ considerably in appearance, particularly in the fall, but all of them form a clear taxonomic genus. Picketwood is deciduous and unusual in that it produces vegetatively, not sexually, using a sort of proto-stolon well above ground level. The stolons are distinguishable from the picketwood’s normal branches because they always form in groups of four, at right angles to one another, and grow horizontally, rather than spreading from the main trunk. They extend outward for from ten to fifteen meters, at which point they form adventitious buds that develop into nodes, extending rootlets vertically down to ground level. Each rootlet then establishes itself as a new ‘main trunk,’ extending the original plant and radiating stolons of its own. Sometimes, a stolon runs into one from another picketwood system, at which point they merge, sending down a rootlet from the new junction point. Because of that, it’s difficult to say where one picketwood begins and another one ends—or if they ever do end, really. Studies indicate that the merging stolons’ share genetic material in putting down their rootlet, and the trunk which develops from that rootlet isn’t a clone of either parent, but a new individual, although physically linked to both of the systems in which it arose. There’s some speculation that—”

“Ah, that will do, Ms. Harrington,” Gleason interrupted. His eyes had widened as she rattled off her description, and from the corner of one eye she could see Karl trying valiantly to suppress a grin. She hoped Gleason wasn’t looking at him, and she smiled winningly at the professor.

He gazed back at her for several seconds, his expression thoughtful, and she found herself wishing (not for the first time) that she’d been allowed to bring Lionheart to class. Unfortunately, Gleason was clearly one of the faculty members who felt the treecat would be a “disruptive influence” in his classroom. She wasn’t certain, but she suspected he was also one of the people who figured treecats had too little body mass to support a brain large enough for true sentience.

On the other hand, he obviously thought I didn’t support true sentience, either, she thought. It was what her mother would’ve called “snippy” of her, but she didn’t really care.

Obviously he hadn’t paid any attention to who her parents were if he thought he could throw her with a question that simple.

“Yes, well.” Gleason gave himself a shake, then regarded the class as a whole. Fortunately, Karl had his expression back under control.

“As Ms. Harrington has so…competently described, picketwood has a highly unusual mode of reproduction. It provides certain obvious survival advantages, but it also exposes the entire picketwood system to disease and parasite threats. There are additional drawbacks, such as susceptibility to fire, as recent events on Sphinx have demonstrated, but the speed at which picketwood grows and propagates is really quite remarkable. Since picketwood is so widespread and central to Sphinx’s arboreal biosystem, and since over half of you will be returning to Sphinx after you complete your course work here, I thought it would be a good idea for this class if we began by considering those advantages and risk factors.

“Now, Ms. Telford, building on what Ms. Harrington’s shared with us, how would you describe—”

* * *

“I thought old Gleason’s jaw was going to hit the floor, Steph!” Carmen Telford chortled as she, Stephanie, and Karl headed for their next class.

“What’s his problem, anyway?” Karl asked, and Carmen shrugged.

She was in her mid-twenties, at least five or six T-years older than Karl, and like him she was a nativeborn Sphinxian. Her father was Eduardo Telford, Baron Crown Oak, and he and her various uncles and aunts owned several thousand square kilometers of virgin woodland. They intended to develop the timber resources, but they also intended to be certain they didn’t destroy the habitat, and Carmen was here on Manticore to learn the best silviculture techniques for reforestation and sustained timber production. Despite her age advantage and the fact that Stephanie was a mere yeoman’s daughter, the two of them had hit it off well.

“I’m not really sure,” she said now, “but if I had to guess, I’d say it’s probably that he figures the two of you only got here because of who you know. I don’t think anyone here on Manticore was paying a lot of attention to the news when you guys were involved in those forest fires this summer. Gleason sure as heck wasn’t, anyway!”

She made a face.

“He knows your dad’s a baron, Karl, and I think he figures your father pulled strings to get you and your little buddy here—” she twitched her head at Stephanie with a grin that took the sting out of “little buddy”—“seats that should’ve gone to someone else. He doesn’t take the whole ‘provisional ranger’ thing very seriously, I’m afraid. But Steph rang his chimes pretty good, didn’t she?”

“I shouldn’t have done it.” Stephanie shook her head with a sigh. “Mom keeps telling me ‘you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.’”

“Hey, I know your mom!” Karl said, thumping her on the shoulder. “If she’d heard that look-down-my-nose-at-you tone of his, she’d’ve been standing in the back of the room cheering you on, and you know it!”

He probably had a point, Stephanie decided. And even if he didn’t, it was nice of him to be on her side. Of course that, she’d discovered over the last T-year or two, was one of the things friends did for each other, and she smiled warmly up at him.

“Well, at least Mom wouldn’t have whacked me for it,” she conceded. Then she looked down at the time display on her uni-link, and her eyes widened. “Cripes! We’re going to be late for class if we don’t get a move on—come on!

Chapter Eight

The days following Stephanie’s departure turned slowly into weeks. Although he missed her, Anders kept himself busy helping out on his father’s project and going on outings with his Sphinxian friends. Just about every day he messaged Stephanie, trying to provide her with a link to the people and events she’d left behind. She was incredibly busy but did her best to squeak off a message of her own most days.

Anders made sure he was on hand when the “tourist” xeno-anthropologists arrived on Sphinx. Chet and Christine were there, too, as official wilderness guides in the new program established by the SFS and the Sphinx Department of Tourism. Until recently, the SFS had been able to handle what wilderness tourism there’d been, but the aftermath of the severe fire season put an extra strain on the Forestry Service’s resources, even now, and the treecats had raised the profile of the Sphinxian bush.

Never mind that the known treecat areas were restricted. That didn’t keep some poorly informed visitors from thinking they could find a group of treecats and get themselves adopted—and have a nifty pet to take back home. There’d always been those tourists who wanted to “bag” a hexapuma, a peak bear, or some other sample of Sphinx’s oversized wildlife, as well. Happily, the majority of the wilderness tourists were content with less dramatic goals: taking images of condor owls or of Crown Oaks in full autumn foliage, or viewing the magnificent vistas of Megana Canyon or Mikal Falls.

There were still plenty of ways people could come to grief in the bush, however, and the overworked and undermanned SFS rangers couldn’t be everywhere at once. That was where the tourist escort program came in. The guides received a modest stipend for showing tourists the sights, answering questions, and forwarding special requests to the Rangers. They could also help with things like hunting or fishing permits and do a preliminary review of “new species” tourists were certain they’d discovered. And, in the wake of the Bolgeo incident—and the Whitaker incident, for that matter—they kept an eye out for potential poachers and for those visitors stupid enough to try to “pet the hexapuma,” as Frank Lethbridge put it.

And there would always be someone stupid enough to try to pet the hexapuma.

Or feed the swamp siren, Anders thought now with a mental chuckle. Although, he admitted, it hadn’t seemed quite so funny at the time.

Actually, he was glad the guides program had been established. It kept Sphinx’s visitors from coming to grief, and the pay provided a little extra pocket change for Chet and Christine. Jessica wasn’t an official part of the program, but Dr. Whitaker had arranged for her to receive a retainer from the Urako University for assisting his expedition and making her own—and Dirt Grubber’s—expertise available to him on request. She’d argued against accepting it, initially, but Dr. Whitaker had convinced her to agree pointing out that the time she spent as his expedition’s liaison with the treecats was time she couldn’t spend doing anything else. That was certainly true, and Anders was glad his dad had thought of it, although he did wonder sometimes if part of Dr. Whitaker’s generosity wasn’t intended to give the Whitaker team first call on her time rather than the newcomers. Either way, though, it had created a welcome increase in the Pheriss family’s income stream. Jessica didn’t talk about that much, but Anders knew, and he was happy for her.

At the moment, the four young people stood toward the back of the group which had come to greet the new arrivals. Doctor Whitaker and Dr. Nez were up front to represent the Whitaker expedition. Probably Doctor Emberly should have been there, too, but Doctor Whitaker had insisted that work go on at the site.

Chief Ranger Shelton was present to represent the SFS, accompanied by Ainsley Jedrusinski, who’d been assigned as direct liaison between the new arrivals in the SFS. There were various other people Anders didn’t know, including the woman from the tourist office and a small cluster of people who he guessed had something to do with the Manticoran foundation which had arranged to have VIP treatment extended.

The first person off the shuttle was Dr. Sonura Hobbard of Landing University. She was an old friend and member of the unofficial “friends of treecats” group. Following her came a pert woman with tanned skin and obviously artificially red hair. She had a large button nose that gave her face a rather clownish look, but her dark eyes seemed to see everything.

“Doctor Cleonora Radzinsky,” Christine murmured without glancing at her uni-link. “Specialist in non-human intelligence, but obviously humanocentric in her analysis criteria.”

Next came a very tall, very thin man. His pale gray hair was bristle cut, an unfortunate choice in Anders’ opinion, given the way it emphasized just how much his ears stood out. He was carrying a bag in long, big-knuckled hands. Something in his manner dared anyone to touch it without his express permission.

“That has to be Dr. Hidalgo,” Chet said. “I bet he and your dad are going to have some good arguments, Anders.”

Anders nodded, but his gaze was fixed on the man who’d followed Dr. Hidalgo out of the shuttle. Dr. Russell Darrolyn was short and rounded, as if offering a direct contrast to the man in front of him. His hair was the defiant monotone brown of a bad dye-job, and his body language was lively and animated. Alone among the three senior members of the group, he was smiling widely as he debarked.

Each of these senior members had emerged from the shuttle in single file, as neatly spaced as if they were actors taking their places on stage. As soon as Dr. Darrolyn was clear, the remaining passengers came out in the more usual haphazard fashion. Occasionally, one or another would go over to join the group centered around Dr. Hobbard and Doctor Whitaker, but the shuttle held its usual quota of business travelers, families home for visits, and the like.

One of these days, I’ll be waiting for Stephanie to come out, Anders thought. But not for at least two more months…

Eventually, the young people were motioned over to join the group. Needless to say, Jessica and Valiant attracted considerable attention right off.

Jessica handled the babble of questions with grace, becoming a trifle tart only when one of the assistants gushed, “Oh! He looks so soft! Can I pat him?”

“Only if he can pat you,” Jessica snapped. “Seriously. Would you pat a chow-wolv when you first met it?”

Chow-wolvs were native to Trebuchet where, Anders knew, Jessica had spent several years. They were also about the same size as treecats and equally fluffy.

The assistant blinked. “No! They’re known to be vicious.”

“Well,” Jessica said, “treecats aren’t vicious. However, it’s always a good idea to let any animal—even when it’s an herbivore—get to know you before you assume it’s pattable. There are quite a few animals here on Sphinx that would cheerfully take your arm off if they got the opportunity.”

The assistant—one Gretta Grendelson—scowled. “I did ask.”

Valiant patted Jessica gently on one cheek, then elongated himself from his position on her shoulder so he could sniff at Ms. Grendelson’s fingers. He bleeked and gave the woman’s hair a tug.

Ms. Grendelson squealed but didn’t seem unduly upset—in fact, she seemed delighted.

Dr. Radzinsky chuckled. “Well, now you’ve been patted by a treecat, Greta. That’s one for the records.”

She turned to the woman from tourism. “It’s very kind of all of you to come welcome us, but I think we’d like to go to our hotel. We’re staying in Yawata Crossing for the first few days, but I believe we’ll then relocate to Twin Forks to be closer to Doctor Whitaker’s group.”

“That sounds perfectly reasonable to me, Dr. Radzinsky. Please, come this way.” The woman from tourism motioned to Chet and Christine. “Come with us, if you would.”

The groups started breaking up. Anders looked at Jessica, then twitched his head after the departing new arrivals.

“Are you going with them?”

Jessica was frowning. “No. I don’t think so…I could, but I’m not needed for this stage. Later, when they do some of the longer landscape tours, I may go along. That’s what I was planning on, anyway. But now I’m not sure that’s such a good idea.”

They’d turned and started walking to where the air cars were parked.

“Why not?” Anders asked, and Jessica blinked as if she’d only then really become aware of him.

“I’m sorry, Anders. You need a lift?”

Anders shrugged. “I can ride with Dad and Dr. Nez, but they’ll probably want to talk about the new arrivals. I’d just as soon skip that.”

“I can give you a ride back to Twin Forks.”

“If I wouldn’t be in the way…”

Jessica shook her head. “No. I’d be glad to have you.”

Anders commed his dad, then they went along to Jessica’s faithful junker. Once they were aloft, Anders noticed the frown hadn’t left her face.

“What’s wrong, Jess? I thought you were eager to be part of all of this.” And, he added silently, that you could really use the money.

“I was,” Jessica admitted. “But Valiant…I’m not as good as Stephanie at filtering my reaction to his reactions…or at figuring out just what he’s reacting to, especially in a crowd like that.”

Anders shrugged. “You haven’t had as much chance to practice. So what about Valiant?”

“He didn’t like someone there—maybe several someones. My feeling is that he’d prefer to avoid at least some of them.”

“What didn’t he like? Being patted?”

“No. Despite my getting cranky, I think he liked that idiot Greta. He’s actually really good about patting. He even lets my little sisters comb him almost every night. Tiddles even put a bow around his neck yesterday, and he was nobly patient—although he took it off as soon as she fell asleep. No, it was more than that.”

She piloted in silence for a while, then sighed. “I suppose what I should do is spend more time with them so Valiant can isolate whoever it is he doesn’t like, but ’cats aren’t like us. Because of the telempathy, I think it’s sort of uncomfortable—almost painful—for them to be around someone they don’t like.”

“I remember Steph told me Lionheart would snarl and hiss when he sensed Bolgeo.”

“Right. Not that there’s any reason to think we have another Bolgeo here. I suspect there are many types of people Valiant wouldn’t like—the hyper-ambitious or manipulative sorts, y’know?”

“I think I do. You realize that group’s going to have a lot of that kind of personality? You’ve met my dad, so you know the type. Scientists working on the cutting edge of any field tend to be really competitive. Why not take it day by day?”

Jessica nodded. “That’s what I’ll do. Hey, thanks for listening.”

“Any time.” Anders grinned. “Any time at all.”

* * *

“So always remember that the most important thing whenever you first approach a potential crime scene,” Dr. Flouret said, standing in the middle of the holographic projection, “is to disturb nothing. The instant you begin interacting with evidence, you begin altering it.”

The broad shouldered, blond-haired professor regarded his students sternly. He reminded Stephanie of a character she’d seen in an old HD which had been set in what its producers had fondly imagined Old Earth must have been like before the Diaspora. That character had been a professor, too, and he’d worn something called “glasses” to correct some sort of vision problem. He’d worn them low on his nose so that he could peer over their tops at his students, and she was pretty sure Dr. Flouret would have done exactly the same thing. But even if he was inclined to be a bit fussy, he was also one of the smartest people she’d ever met.

He was an old friend of Dr. Hobbard’s, too, although Stephanie and Karl had been very careful to avoid even appearing to impose upon that friendship. Dr. Hobbard had told them they could turn to Dr. Flouret in case they had any serious problems, but neither of them was going to draw on what Karl had dubbed their “emergency hatch key” unless they really needed it. Not when it could have repercussions for Dr. Hobbard. Or for Dr. Flouret, for that matter.

They’d spent the last couple of weeks studying the theory of criminal forensics and the tools—from DNA sniffers to old-fashioned meter sticks—available to the criminal investigator. There were more of those than Stephanie had ever realized, but Dr. Flouret had emphasized over and over again that the most important tools of all were the human eye and the human brain behind it. All of the detection and measuring devices in the universe were useless, he pointed out, unless someone was able to combine their output into an accurate reconstruction of what had happened. This was the first time they’d examined an actual “crime scene” (or its holographic reproduction, at least), however, and Stephanie cautioned herself sternly against her normal tendency to rush in and take charge. She’d been working on developing what her mother called “more mature interpersonal skills,” and she’d discovered that several of the students who were older than she was resented the way she tended to charge ahead when something caught her interest.

“Bleek!” someone said in her ear, and that same someone’s whiskers tickled her cheek. One of the things Stephanie absolutely loved about Dr. Flouret was that, unlike any of their other professors here at the University, he actively encouraged her to bring Lionheart to class. She wasn’t sure if that was as a favor to his friend Dr. Hobbard or because of his own fascination with treecats, but she deeply appreciated his attitude. And it was another reason she wasn’t going to charge brashly forward and step on other people’s toes—not when she was already receiving “special privileges” by being allowed to bring her “pet” to class with her!

“Evidence must be collected so that it can be properly assessed and analyzed,” the professor continued. “And it must be collected and recorded in ways which can be reliably reproduced, not simply in the lab, but when the investigator’s conclusions are presented in an evidentiary format in court, as well. If an investigator is to present evidence convincingly, he must not only be certain of his own conclusions but be able to reproduce that evidence, to demonstrate the basis for his conclusions reliably, accurately, and in a fashion which educates the layman. All of those things are critical portions of what a forensic criminologist is and does, but it’s your responsibility to be as certain as humanly possible that the evidence you collect is accurate, honest, and unaltered. It’s your job to form conclusions, not to pass judgment, and you have a moral responsibility as well as a legal obligation to do so as impartially as you possibly can. So before you pass your sniffer over the first piece of evidence, before you take your first step into the crime scene, record every aspect of it from as many perspectives as possible in as much detail as possible. Know where every single piece of evidence comes from. Be able to place it in a detailed computer model of the scene, and be certain before you disturb any of it that at a later date you’ll be able to know and to demonstrate its physical relationship and proximity to every other piece of evidence you may examine.”

His expression and his tone were very serious, and heads nodded among the students seated in the lecture hall around the holographic stage. He gazed at them for several seconds, looking over the tops of those “glasses” he wasn’t wearing, then nodded.

“Very well,” he said, and glanced down at the “dead body” at his feet. “This is a re-creation of an actual crime scene. For obvious reasons, I’m not going to tell you what really happened here, or when, or even where. After all—” he raised his eyes, darting another look at the class, and Stephanie had the oddest sensation that he was looking directly at her “—we wouldn’t want any of you looking the case up to find out what the courts decided had happened.”

A chorus of student chuckles answered him, and he smiled.

“Now, Ms. Harrington,” he invited. “Suppose you join me here and give us all the benefit of your insightful observations.”

* * *

“I feel like an idiot,” Stephanie groused to Karl as they headed across the quadrangle towards their dormitory. “I should’ve realized that wasn’t blood!”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Karl said judiciously, with something which looked suspiciously like a grin. “It looked like blood to me.”

“Well, it wasn’t,” Stephanie replied in a withering tone. She really, really didn’t like making public mistakes.

“Seriously, Steph,” Karl said, his grin fading, “he was making a point. All of us have a tendency to jump to conclusions, especially when the evidence seems so clear. I don’t think anyone else in the class questioned whether or not it was blood, either. That was the whole point.”

“Well, I wish he’d chosen someone else to make it,” she said feelingly.

“I guess I can understand that. But I kinda think he was killing two birds with one stone, Steph.”

“Oh, yeah?” She knew she sounded sour.

“Yeah. I know you’ve been sort of hanging back in class to keep from getting up the noses of some of the other students, but you and Lionheart can’t really hide, whatever you do, you know. I think it was his way of making the point that anyone can make a mistake…and of letting you be the one to make it this time. Some of ’em are going to take it as proof you’re not as hot a hotshot as they think you think you are, but most of the others’re going to sympathize with you. Might just help out in the long run, you know.”

Stephanie regarded him skeptically, but once she thought about it for a few moments, she had to admit he might have a point. Not that it made her feel a lot better about jumping to conclusions like that. Still, it was something to think about.

* * *

A few days after the Radzinsky group arrived, a formal meet-and-greet was held so that the visitors could be introduced to various important residents of the planet. Anders went as part of his dad’s expedition. Jessica and Valiant were there, as well, as were Chet and Christine. The “Double Cs” had tamed their flamboyant hairstyles in honor of their new job and looked very mature in their new guide uniforms.

The meet-and-greet was about as much fun as Anders had always found such events—that is, not much fun at all, unless you happened to be an enthusiast on the particular reason for the gathering. Anders was interested in treecats, but not so much in the fine points of anthropology which were under discussion. Still, between his parents’ different jobs, he’d had a lot of experience with such events.

Jessica, on the other hand, was clearly overwhelmed. Valiant—hand-feet on her shoulder, true-feet on a support built into the back of her dress—stared at the humans clustered around, his green eyes wide with what might be the beginnings of panic.

Anders hurried over to Jessica’s side, making his way through the little crowd of onlookers who’d gathered to get a better look at a real, live treecat. Dr. Darrolyn, the linguistics expert, was asking Jessica questions. For all that his smile was warm and affable, there was something hammering about how he fired them off.

“So, is Valiant communicating with you this moment?”

“I can feel a bit of what he’s feeling,” Jessica admitted.

“And that is?”

“Well, there are a lot of people here. I think he’s a bit overwhelmed.”

“But you have a large family, don’t you? Two adults, six children? Certainly Valiant is used to crowds?”

“He knows my family—” Jessica began.

“But the treecat must know a fair number of the people here?” Dr. Darrolyn cut her off.

“He’s met Doctor Whitaker’s group, yes, but he doesn’t really know them well. And most of the rest of you are complete strangers.”

“Are you certain you’re not projecting your own apprehensions on the animal?”

Jessica stared at the linguist in shock. “Are you saying I’m lying?”

Dr. Darrolyn smiled condescendingly, and his words took on a lecturing tone. “I’m saying that—in my field—we’ve learned that humans often project their own emotional landscape onto their animal companions. A man sees his dog wagging his tail and looking eager. He thinks, ‘My dog is happy to see me.’ This may be so, but only because the dog associates the man with food or outings. So what the man interprets as affection may only be a hope for some service the man supplies the dog.”

Jessica’s eyes narrowed. “I am not projecting my reactions on the Valiant. I really can feel what he feels. He doesn’t—”

She cut herself off, but Anders could guess that what she’d been about to say was something like, “And he doesn’t like you at all.” From the flicker in Dr. Darrolyn’s expression, he guessed the linguist had figured it out too.

Anders inserted himself into the conversation. “Jessica, I hate to interrupt, but Doctor Emberly was wondering if you could spare her a moment.”

He’d checked, and Calida Emberly was just visible on the far side of the room, talking quietly with her mother, who appeared to be sketching.

“Sure,” Jessica said. She bobbed her head politely to Dr. Darrolyn. “If you’ll excuse me.”

“I look forward to talking with you further,” Dr. Darrolyn said.

Valiant’s “bleek” could have meant anything.

“Thanks for rescuing me from those x-a’s,” Jessica said under cover of the room’s general noise level as they walked away.

“X-a’s?”

“Xeno-anthropologists.” Jessica laughed. “It’s too much of a mouthful to say all the time.”

“I like it,” Anders said. “It sounds vaguely like a curse, which is about how I feel about the whole profession right now.”

“Me, too. Valiant, three. I’ll tell you more later.”

As they approached Dr. Emberly, Anders said, “I brought Jessica and Valiant over like you asked.”

Calida Emberly was not a pretty woman—in fact, she was actually pretty stern looking—but she had an enthusiasm for her profession and life in general that could make her almost beautiful. Now she extended a hand to Jessica and then to Valiant.

“I did, did I? Will that was very clever of me. Was Dr. Darrolyn getting intense?”

“That’s an understatement,” Jessica agreed. “You don’t seem surprised.”

“I’m not. They haven’t been here even three full days, and Darrolyn’s already had Kesia on the verge of tears. Radzinsky and your father are barely speaking, and Hidalgo has accused the SFS of corrupting a potentially sentient species.”

“Kesia in tears?” Anders was appalled. He remembered how staunchly Kesia Guyen had stood up to his father when they’d been stranded. “I didn’t think that was possible.”

“Well, he all but promised to message the review board at our university saying she should be denied her doctorate on the grounds that she’s fallen into superstitious thinking rather than good science.”

“What a blackhole!” Jessica said. “I can see we’re going to have a lot of fun while they’re here.”

“Don’t worry,” Anders said. “You volunteered to help them out, so you can un-volunteer.” He smiled suddenly. “From what Dr. Emberly says, I’m sure it wouldn’t break Dad’s heart to find something else for you to do! The ones I feel sorry for are Chet and Christine. They’re not going to be able to duck out.”

“And to think I was disappointed that I didn’t have time to take enough of classes to qualify as a guide,” Jessica replied. “For today, though, I’m going to do my best. Time to march back into the fray. Thanks again, Anders, for getting me a breather.”

“Let me come with you,” he suggested.

Did Jessica blush? He couldn’t be sure.

“No. I need to be at least as tough as Stephanie,” she said. “She dealt with a lot of this sort of thing when she wasn’t much more than twelve.”

Dacey Emberly held up her sketch pad and showed them the quick drawing of Valiant she’d done. “There. That will justify your stop here. Jessica, you might consider taking Anders up on his offer if you need to do one-on-one interviews. He isn’t an anthropologist, but he knows the jargon. They can’t really send him off the way they could Chet or Christine without insulting his father, either.”

“I’ll think about it,” Jessica promised. She gave them a lazy wave and moved off into the throng.

Anders watched her go.

“You know,” he said to no one in particular, “in her own way, Jessica’s just as brave as Stephanie. I wonder why she doesn’t realize it?”

* * *

Dirt Grubber made certain Windswept was solidly asleep before he slipped outside to spend some time with his plants. If she awoke, she would know he was close, but he doubted she would. The day’s events had been enough to overwhelm even a tough youngling like her.

Once outside, Dirt Grubber reveled in the night’s coolness. The two-legs were now using some kind of heating thing to make the inside of their stone lair nearly as warm as summer. He supposed such devices were a good idea for two-legs, since they possessed no fur worth speaking of, but for a Person who was developing the beginnings of what would be a nice, thick winter coat, the interior heat could be a bit oppressive.

As he checked over his plants, patting the soil a bit higher to protect the stem of this one, nipping new growth off that one so the plant would not waste energy on leaves that would certainly be ruined by frost, Dirt Grubber sorted through his impressions of the large gathering to which Windswept had taken him that evening.

From the excitement and apprehension that had colored her mind-glow, he had known this was an important event. Therefore, although his immediate reaction to the crowded space had been to depart as soon as possible, he had given his two-leg his fullest support. It had not taken long for him to realize that he was the focus of a great deal of attention. When he considered who was present, this seemed reasonable.

Old Authority was there, along with several of his clan. Also present was Garbage Collector, as the People now called the father of Bleached Fur. This title was in memory of how Garbage Collector had gathered up the People’s leavings and stood guard over them, even in the face of a hungry whistling sucker. Garbage Collector had brought his clan, as well, and Dirt Grubber had been particularly pleased to see Plant Woman and Image Maker, whose mind-glows he had found to be very compatible with his own.

Then there were the group he had seen arrive on a flying thing similar to that which had taken Climbs Quickly, Death Fang’s Bane, and Shadowed Sunlight away. Many of these came and spoke with Windswept. He noticed she was careful to be very polite with them, but this was not the politeness of respect but that of being guarded.

Dirt Grubber could not read the mind-glows of all two-legs as easily as he could that of Windswept, but he would need to be far stupider than he was not to realize that one thing many of these two-legs had in common was an intense interest in the People. He had become accustomed to having two-legs stare at him when he went somewhere with Windswept. He had learned to be polite about the attention and, in turn, most of the two-legs were relatively good about keeping their distance. Tonight, however, was different. There was an intensity in the mind-glows of almost everyone who came near, as if—if they were given the opportunity—they would have counted his fingers and toes, checked the depth of his fur, fingered his ears.

That was uncomfortable. It was nothing, however, compared to the cold, hard assessment he had felt from a few. Reaching into his memory, Dirt Grubber compared what he was feeling to what Climbs Quickly had told him about his encounter with Speaks Falsely. There were some similarities, but the mind-glows were not the same. Speaks Falsely’s mind-glow had been colored by a willingness to do harm. Dirt Grubber had not felt that sort of willingness from any he had encountered that evening. But what some of these did have in common with Speaks Falsely was a sense that they were holding back, calculating. Pretending to have one interest when what they really wanted was something else.

People did not speak falsely. They could withhold information, but they did not say or think things they knew were not true, nor could one Person deceive another about what he truly desired. Two-legs could deceive one another, but it was hard for Dirt Grubber to wrap his mind around such twisted thinking.

He was also aware that he had not spent time with all the two-legs present. Windswept had spoken mostly with those who had first initiated contact. He had sensed a few malicious breezes from the minds of some who had kept their distance, but that was not unusual. He already knew that not all two-legs liked the People. Sometimes what he tasted from them almost felt like tension over territory or a particularly succulent bit of food. He thought they saw the People as competition.

Reluctantly, Dirt Grubber decided he must do his best to learn more about these new arrivals. From Windswept’s mind-glow, he could tell she expected to meet them again. For the good of the People, Dirt Grubber must try to make the most of those encounters.

Chapter Nine

The morning after the meet-and-greet, Anders felt tense. He might not be a treecat, but he was enough his politician mother’s son to feel uneasy about the hidden agendas he’d sensed the night before.

Sure, he’d expected some tension. However chastened his dad might be, he was still as protective of his permit as the mother of a newborn baby. What Anders hadn’t expected was how, well, political Dr. Radzinsky had been. He’d overheard her talking with Chief Ranger Shelton. From her questions, it was apparent that she had far more knowledge than he would have expected from an off-worlder about the implications treecat sentience could have for Sphinxian land ownership.

He didn’t want to make Stephanie edgy. Her messages were full of how demanding she was finding her classes. He didn’t doubt that she was doing great—Stephanie really was as smart as everyone thought she was—but she was working harder for those perfect grades than she ever had before. And she was so hard on herself when she did mess up. Weeks later, she was still beating herself up over some minor gaffe in forensics class.

Still, he had to let her know something was rotten on the planet Sphinx, so he gave her a quick summary. Then he went on:

“I let Christine and Chet know I thought Radzinsky, at least, has an agenda, and they’re planning to keep a special eye on her—including making notes of those times when she wants them out of the way. Meanwhile, Jess will see how many of the x-a’s we can meet in small groups. She thinks Valiant will be able to get a better read on them that way. I think it will be interesting to see just who doesn’t want to spend time in a small group with a treecat, too.

“Listen, Steph. I’d really like to keep an eye on Jess and Valiant. I’ve got this idea, though, that she thinks she’d be imposing. Could you message her, tell her it would be good to have me along? I know what my dad is capable of and—hard as it may be for you to believe—he’s actually really ethical. He’d never cook his data or anything. I’m not so sure about some of the others.

“I’ll cover things here for you. You study hard. That’s why I let you out of my reach, right? Say, hi to Karl and tell Lionheart I’m saving part of my allowance to buy him a bouquet of celery when he gets back.”

He mimed giving her a big hug. “Miss you!”

* * *

Climbs Quickly stretched out along the smooth, rocky shelf outside the nesting place they had given Death Fang’s Bane and panted quietly. The sun was unnaturally hot, burning down out of a sky which wasn’t quite the right shade of blue, and he found himself wishing he had had some warning about just how warm this new place, this new world, was going to be. At least Death Fang’s Bane’s nesting place’s window faced toward sun-rising, so the bulk of the structure threw a welcome patch of shade over this shelf each afternoon. For that matter, things in general had improved since he’d started shedding, and he could always retreat to the coolness of Death Fang’s Bane’s sleeping place. But it was still hotter here—even in the shade—than any of the people could ever have anticipated.

He disliked being separated from his two-leg so much of the time. She did not like it either; he could tell that from her mind-glow, even when she was far away. She had made it clear enough that she had no choice, however, and Climbs Quickly had learned more than enough about how the two-legs’ clans worked to understand that neither Death Fang’s Bane nor her parents could always arrange things the way they might wish to. The two-legs’ elders clearly had a great deal to say about how all two-legs lived their lives, and he had discovered that Sings Truly’s warning that it was important for the People to understand how these strange creatures thought had been even better taken than he had thought at the time.

Still, it would help me to understand them better if I could accompany Death Fang’s Bane more places, he reflected, flattening even closer to the cool, shaded shelf. It helps that she is so happy to be learning so many things—it is like watching a kitten scamper down a ground runner’s burrow! Yet I know she misses Bleached Fur, and she feels guilty about leaving me so much to my own devices.

He treated himself to a quiet mental laugh at that thought, for he was confident few of the older two-legs realized what sorts of opportunities this nesting place offered to one of the People. Death Fang’s Bane did, although she had done her very best to warn him about being careless. It had amused him, for even though their inability to communicate clearly with one another remained frustrating, she had reminded him irresistibly of old Broken Foot, the half-crippled scout who had been entrusted with teaching Climbs Quickly and his fellow kittens about the perils of the world. Of course, that had been more hands of turnings ago than Climbs Quickly really cared to think about, but the message had been clear enough. And so had the fact that Death Fang’s Bane had been fairly sure she was not supposed to be encouraging him to roam.

It was a long way from this ledge to the nearest of the strange trees growing in this place, but not so far that a healthy scout could not make the leap between them, especially when he seemed to weigh so much less than he was accustomed to. And even though he knew Death Fang’s Bane worried about him whenever he was out on his own, she also understood that he was a scout of the People. She might not like it, and he had sensed her concern about the sorts of trouble he might find to get into in this world which was so different from his own, but she had not attempted to lock him up here in her nesting place. Instead, she had trusted him not to get into trouble and he had not. For all his sister’s and Broken Tooth’s lectures about impetuosity, he was not really heedless enough to take foolish chances. So his explorations had been cautious, largely under cover of night, and more for his own amusement and to defeat boredom than anything else, when he came down to it.

Now he rolled back over, ears twitching as he sensed Death Fang’s Bane’s mind-glow coming back towards her nesting place. Her mind was already reaching out to him, despite the fact that she had no idea what she was doing or how, and the inner warmth of that touch flowed through him like a welcome sigh of wind creeping delicately through the leaves of Bright Water’s central nesting place.

* * *

Anders didn’t know exactly what Stephanie said to convince Jessica, but about a week after the meet-and-greet, after she’d brought Valiant along to solemnly consider the Whitaker expedition’s latest collection of treecat artifacts, she asked him if he’d go with her the next day when she had a private interview with Dr. Hidalgo.

“I’d really appreciate your coming,” Jessica said as he walked back to her air car with her. “He’s the one whose area of specialization is like your dad’s right? Would he mind? And should I get his permission first—because of the retainer, and everything?”

“You mean, would Dad think I was consorting with the enemy or something?” Anders laughed. “Not really. He’d probably be grateful, actually—give him an idea of how the other side is thinking. And that retainer’s really just to reimburse you for the time you’re spending helping him out. It doesn’t mean you can’t help anyone else, you know.”

Although, he reflected, knowing his dad as he did, Dr. Whitaker wouldn’t object if Jessica thought it did.

“Great! Thanks. I’m a little nervous. This is going to be my first interview with one of the big guns.”

“You’re kidding! I thought you’d had a bunch of meetings already.”

“I’ve had a couple,” Jessica admitted, “but they’ve been with some of the assistants. That Gretta Grendelson—the one who wanted to pet Valiant at the shuttleport—we’ve had a couple of meetings, but she’s more a biologist than an anthropologist. She’s really interested in things like the treecats’ tails—how they are prehensile and how the gripping surface is designed.”

“Did Valiant like being poked?”

“Actually, he was pretty good about it. I got the feeling he’s neutral about Gretta.”

Anders frowned. “That sounds sort of like you’ve met with someone you don’t think he’s neutral about.”

“You sound,” Jessica giggled, “like an anthropologist. You’re right, though…. One time Gretta brought along one of Doctor Radzinsky’s other assistants—a man named Duff DeWitt.”

Anders searched his memory. “I think I’ve talked with him. Good-looking guy, blond hair, looks like he lifts weights?”

Did Jessica blush?

“That’s him. He had lots of questions about treecat behavior.”

“You said you thought Valiant didn’t like him.”

Yes, she was blushing.

“Well, yeah…Mr. DeWitt is…I mean, he likes…He’s sort of a flirt. Gretta thought it was great, but how he talked made me uncomfortable.”

Anders snorted. “You’re really pretty, Jessica. It doesn’t seem strange to me that he’d flirt with you.”

Jessica rolled her eyes. “It was more than that. He was the sort that made me feel like he flirted by reflex. He knows he’s good looking, so he sees where that might get him.”

“And you think Valiant didn’t like that.”

“I think it’s as good an explanation as any as to why Valiant was obviously uneasy with him. I messaged Stephanie, and she agreed the treecats don’t seem to like insincerity.”

“Neither does Stephanie.” Anders laughed. “Anyhow, I’d be glad to go with you when you meet with Dr. Hidalgo. When is your appointment?”

“Is tomorrow too soon?”

Anders shook his head. “What time?”

“Mid-morning,” Jessica replied as they reached her parked air car.” We’re supposed to meet in one of the conference rooms at their hotel. Do you need a lift?”

“I wouldn’t mind,” Anders said. “The expedition’s air car’s been a lot more in demand since the x-a’s got here and not everyone is going out to the site every day.”

“Great! See you then!”

* * *

Anders was right in his prediction that Doctor Whitaker would approve of his son going along for the meeting with Dr. Hidalgo.

“He’s very good,” was the reluctant admission. “He really appreciated my artifact collection. In fact, I think he’s the closest of the three senior members of the group to coming around to accepting that the treecats should be placed somewhere on the sentience scale.”

“Somewhere? Human somewhere?”

“Oh, probably not.” Doctor Whitaker waved a dismissive hand. “I’d like to see what conclusions you reach about him.”

“So you’re not going to contaminate the sample further.” Anders laughed. “Okay, Dad. I’ll let you know what I think.”

The next morning when Jessica picked him up, he asked, “Does Dr. Hidalgo know I’m coming along?”

“Yep. I told him I might need a translator who spoke anthropologist.”

“And he didn’t have any problems?”

“Not that I could see. Actually, he said some good things about your dad’s collections.”

Dr. Hidalgo had folded his long, thin length down into a chair at one end of the conference room, but he unfolded himself as soon as they entered. “Good morning and thank you both for coming, it’s—” He stopped, shook his head, and corrected himself. "Thank you all for coming."

Anders wondered who’d been omitted in that first greeting—himself or Valiant—but he didn’t think asking would be polite.

Dr. Hidalgo continued, this time addressing Jessica in particular. “I believe Valiant is a gardener. Would he be more comfortable if we went outside for our meeting? This complex has some very nice gardens, and they’re just about empty this time of day.”

Jessica beamed at him. “He’d like that. Besides, I think he finds indoor heating a little uncomfortable this time of year. His coat’s been thickening since the nights started getting cooler.”

“And how do you cope with that?” Dr. Hidalgo asked as he waved toward a door that led out into the promised gardens.

“Well, he always has the freedom to go outside, and I keep my own room cooler. I don’t mind wearing a sweater. My family got here in summer, so I haven’t actually lived through the winter, but I’ve heard a lot from my friends. I think Valiant’s going to need as dense a coat as possible when the snows fly.”

“Very thoughtful.” Doctor Hidalgo nodded approval.

Anders thought though that the x-a had arrived at a slightly different conclusion than his words might lead one to imagine. He glanced at Valiant, trying to see with the treecat was thinking, but Valiant was busy stretching up from his perch on Jessica’s shoulder so that he could inspect a vine that had been trained along a nearby trellis without damaging the plant.

Doctor Hidalgo’s questions followed a predictable pattern. He asked about Valiant’s carry net and whether he had made it himself. He asked about the other tools Valiant used, and how easily he adapted to human technology—both those things he could employ himself, like the sample bags, and those things he used indirectly, such as riding in an air car.

Eventually, they arrived at a neat little gazebo, furnished with tables and benches. When they settled there, Doctor Hidalgo asked Jessica if Valiant would mind showing off some of his basic skills, like tying knots or handling various tools. The swiftness with which Valiant agreed told Anders even without the “thumbs up” Jessica gave him that the treecat found nothing threatening about this particular member of the x-a group.

Jessica obviously liked Doctor Hidalgo, too. Anders had to admit that there was something charming about the way he’d tug at one of his jug-handle ears and murmur, “Amazing!” or “It’s different to see it in person rather than recorded.” He always asked for permission before recording a particular action, too, never simply assuming that permission previously given flowed over to the next.

When they’d been in the gazebo a while, Doctor Hidalgo announced, “I think we all deserve a break. Shall I call and order some refreshments? Perhaps lunch?”

They agreed and not long after, as they sat munching on sandwiches piled high on thick-cut bread, Jessica asked, “So, off the record, what do you think of treecats?”

Doctor Hidalgo stopped disassembling his sandwich and considered. “Off the record?”

Jessica held up her uni-link as if to show she wasn’t recording.

“Very well.” Doctor Hidalgo slowly rolled a slice of roast capri-cow and considered. “I think that there’s no doubt that the treecats will place somewhere on the sentience scale. They’re tool-users and tool-makers. They also show a desire for more tools to fill their basic needs. Some of the potsherds and fragments of gourds Dr. Whitaker’s collected show definite ornamentation. It’s not elaborate, true, but it serves no other function than a desire for, if not beauty, then at least differentiation.”

“And that raises them up the sentience scale?” Jessica asked.

“Especially at this primitive level,” Doctor Hidalgo agreed. “Watching Valiant has been very interesting. I chose these gardens because they contain plants that are purely ornamental as well as some that are both ornamental and edible. While Valiant shows a preference for those that are edible, he doesn’t seem to be immune to beauty.

“Of course,” he added, sounding embarrassed, “some of my colleagues would say I’m being subjective.”

“How do the others in your group feel about the treecats?” Anders asked.

“They’re proving more difficult to convince,” Doctor Hidalgo said sadly. “I indicate the artifacts, and Dr. Radzinsky counters with examples of other creatures that make tools or elaborate dens. I mention the ornamentation, and Dr. Darrolyn asks if I see any evidence of written language—or even spoken language.”

He sighed, tore a small square of bread from his sandwich, squashed it into a pill, and swallowed it. “Then there’s the problem that we’re dealing with contaminated samples.”

“Contaminated?” Jessica asked.

For reply, Doctor Hidalgo pointed to where Valiant was carefully sliding some seeds into one of the sample bags.

“Where once there was a potentially pristine culture,” he said, “we now have one irrevocably contaminated by its contact with humans. I’m not blaming you, young lady. The SFS gave tools to treecats before you ever set foot on this planet. However, once the damage is done, it becomes more difficult to judge just how intelligent a species is. Take Valiant’s interest in gardening. There’s some evidence the treecats observed humans practicing agriculture and decided to imitate. That’s quite different from evolving the skill on their own.”

Jessica looked uncomfortable as Doctor Hidalgo went on.

“I, personally, would like to see two things. First, I’d like to see the treecats recognized as sentient. Then I would like to see some effort made to protect them in their uncontaminated state. Populations that haven’t had human contact should be kept from human contact. Populations that have had human contact—for example, the clans from which Valiant and Lionheart originated—should be relocated to areas where they can practice their indigenous lifestyles in a manner uncontaminated by human influence. Only in this way can they evolve into the people they were meant to be. Otherwise, they’ll become poor imitations of humanity.”

“You must be joking!” Jessica exclaimed. “Treecats are treecats. They could never become humans.”

“Precisely,” Doctor Hidalgo said. He pulled at one ear lobe and smiled sadly. “Earlier you mentioned the care you’d taken to make sure Valiant developed his thick winter coat. However, if something happened to interfere, would you let him freeze?”

“Never!”

“So you’d either keep him indoors—an unnatural state for a treecat—or you’d provide him with clothing of some sort. Even in Dr. Whitaker’s most careful excavations, we’ve seen no evidence the treecats need clothing other than their natural fur. Therefore, your desire to protect him would introduce an alien element into his life. If treecats do have some form of communication—something I believe is so, although Doctor Darrolyn differs with me—that idea would be spread further.”

Jessica looked stunned. It seemed to Anders that she was wilting where she sat. He knew how much care both Jessica and Stephanie took to make sure that their treecat partners visited not only with each other, but with their clans. What would happen if treecats were isolated on reservations for their own good? Would those treecats who had adopted humans become exiles?

Valiant set aside his sample bag and bleeked softly. Then he loped over to Jessica and snuggled his furry head into the wild mass of her hair. However, he neither snarled nor growled at Doctor Hidalgo, so Anders guessed that the treecat could tell the man meant him no harm.

No harm. Only imprisonment. Only isolation from his own people and those people sealed away in tidy little reservations where they can practice their folkways in peace. Anders swallowed hard. And you can bet that the lands “given” to treecats wouldn’t be the best. They’d be destroyed by the “kindness” of people like Doctor Hidalgo.

He remembered a section from the book Dr. Nez had given him for his birthday. There’d been an entire chapter on how less advanced cultures had been destroyed by forced assimilation into more advanced ones. But that same chapter had also offered up examples of how often well-intended efforts to protect those less advanced cultures had ended up confining, strangling, and ultimately destroying them just as thoroughly as assimilation possibly could have.

“I’m sorry, Anders,” Doctor Hidalgo said. “Did you say something?”

“No, sir.” Anders tried hard to sound normal. “Just thinking about some of the long-term implications.”

“Ah. A natural anthropologist, following in your father’s footsteps.”

Anders forced himself to grin, but inside he winced. He thought about Stephanie’s reports about how Lionheart was shedding. When Stephanie and Lionheart came home, would she put the ’cat in a sweater? He imagined the x-a’s reaction, how Hidalgo would be sorrowful about the contamination of culture, how some of the others would certainly sneer.

For the first time since Stephanie had left, he found himself wishing her return could somehow be delayed.

* * *

In addition to his usual scouting duties, Keen Eyes went out of his way to patrol along the sun-setting edge of the clan’s range where he had sensed Swimmer’s Scourge and Nimble Fingers of the Trees Enfolding Clan. Aware that this was a dangerous area, Keen Eyes requested that the other members of the Landless Clan keep back from it. He did not meet with any complaint, for he had shared Swimmers Scourge’s warning with the rest of the clan. Moreover, the loss of their home meant there were tasks enough to keep every set of true-hands and hand-feet busy every waking moment of the day.

Keen Eyes himself hunted when he could, setting traps and snares for small game. He was removing a tree-hopper from one of his snares when a mind-voice spoke.

<Those snares may catch you more than tree-hoppers and bark-chewers, Keen Eyes of the Landless Clan. You might want to move a little further towards sun-rising.>

Keen Eyes recognized Nimble Fingers of the Trees Enfolding Clan, but when he searched for the other’s mind-glow, he did not touch it. He wondered if Nimble Fingers had a mate, for one benefit of such a partnership was that both the mind-voice and ability to detect the mind-glows of others intensified. That would explain why Nimble Fingers could find him while he could find no trace of the other. He suspected Nimble Fingers was at extreme range, but, nonetheless, he took care to dampen his own mind-glow, uncomfortable that someone who was not a clan member or a friend would have such an advantage over him.

He replied politely. <May I keep my prey, or do you claim it?>

<Keep it, but when you reset the snare, move it further to sun-rising. There are those in my clan who fear that your People will seep into our territory as water overflows the banks of a river.>

<And you would dam the spread of that river?>

<Such is the command of the elders of my clan.>

Keen Eyes thought that perhaps Nimble Fingers did not completely agree. However, the way of the People, as contained in the oldest songs of the memory singers, was that the wisdom of the elders was to be listened to by the younger members. In this way, the entire clan could avoid errors made in the past.

Usually, Keen Eyes had no problem agreeing with this approach. A traditional way of teaching hunting was to let the youngling attempt a hunt or two without coaching. Only after the youngling had gone hungry from a pounce too soon or from not knowing a particular trick of the intended prey did the serious teaching begin, for only then did the youngling realize that there was something to value in past experience.

Lately, however, he had begun to wonder why the elders should have the final say when the problem was one in which they had no genuine experience to guide them. Of course there had been forest fires in the past, but these fires were among the first where the ability of the People to move into new ranges was complicated by the presence of the two-legs.

He heaved a gusty sigh but, as it was his own policy not to challenge the rights of the Trees Enfolding Clan lest they decide the time of toleration was ended, he could not protest.

<I thank you, Nimble Fingers, for letting me keep my prey. Would you perhaps like to come share it with me?>

<That is kind of you, Keen Eyes, but I had better keep my post. Our clan has not suffered as severely as you report your own has, but the mind healers have asked us to do as little as possible to upset our clan’s internal harmony—and that means not upsetting the elders.>

Keen Eyes was very interested. Even the ability to share thoughts did not mean the People were immune to disagreement. When consensus could not be reached, that disagreement could sometimes become intense enough the mind healers stepped in. Healing always involved a certain amount of work on the mind of the victim as well as the body even for purely physical injury—moderating of pain, offering comfort and reassurance. Mind healers, however, specialized in touching actual minds, feeling where they had become twisted from the true and helping them return to understanding that the needs of others were as important as the needs of the individual.

<Your elders are stretched thin?>

Nimble Fingers’ reply overflowed with exhaustion. <We lost much of what had been stored up against the winter to a fire on our moss-growing border. We also lost several members of the clan.>

<And suffered injuries no doubt.> Keen Eyes was glad they were communicating only by mind-voice. If Nimble Fingers had been close enough to immerse himself in Keen Eyes’ mind-glow there would have been no hiding the bitterness Keen Eyes felt.

<Many injuries. Not so much from the fire itself as from the smoke. It blanketed the forests for a great distance beyond where the fires burned.> The innocent agreement in Nimble Fingers’ reply confirmed Keen Eyes’ guess that Nimble Fingers could not read his mind-glow. <Several of our wisest elders were killed or disabled. The clan is still trying to sort out who has the most balanced view of how we should deal with our changed situation.>

<There are different opinions, then?>

<Many, from whether we should change our central nesting site to what to do about….>

Nimble Fingers’ mind-voice trailed off. On the whole, People were not very good at hiding things. They were simply too accustomed to shared mind-glows. Scouts and memory singers probably had the most teaching in that area, for they were the most likely to deal with People who did not share the same priorities.

Keen Eyes wondered what Nimble Fingers had been about to say. “What to do about the invaders?” Or something more mild, “What to do about those poor refugees?” He considered asking, but decided against it. On the whole, Nimble Fingers had been kind to him and, by extension, to the Landless Clan. Nothing would be gained by challenging him.

Instead, he said, <Our clan has been relying heavily on our mind healers. We are lucky that although we lost all our memory singers, we did not lose our mind healers.>

<You are fortunate. We lost our most senior mind healer, a true wellspring of wisdom about the twisting paths down which the pain of a few strong minds can lead a clan accustomed to following them.>

That told Keen Eyes quite a lot. If the People of Trees Enfolding were dealing with conflict within their own clan, it explained why the Landless Clan had been kept in their particular limbo, neither welcomed and helped, nor driven away.

<I am sorry. I hope the healing comes quickly.>

<I do as well. This is a bad situation for all of us.>

His phrasing included the Landless Clan as well, and Keen Eyes was warmed. But Nimble Fingers’ next thought reminded him that the danger was far from ended—that, indeed, it intensified with every sun’s passing that brought them closer to the need to make a final decision.

<Swimmer’s Scourge comes. He would not like to find me chatting at my post. Remember. Move your snares further to sun-rising. Remember….>

Keen Eyes sent back a quick promise that he would, but as he shouldered the carry net with his catch and prepared to lope in the direction of home, he wondered just how long they could obey such warnings. In time, his clan must press to sun-setting…or die.

Chapter Ten

“Stephanie! Karl!”

They halted and turned in the direction of the shout. A young man, perhaps five years older than Karl, waved and came towards them, accompanied by a somewhat older, blond-haired, green-eyed woman. Stephanie recognized Allen Harper, one of Dean Charterman’s assistants. He was a grad student—in geology, she thought—and he was also from Sphinx, which was why Charterman had assigned him to show her and Karl around campus for their initial orientation. She had no idea who his companion might be, though.

“Are we catching you between classes?” Harper asked as the newcomers reached them, and Karl shook his head.

“We’re done till supper,” he said. “Just heading back to the dorm to get Lionheart back into the air-conditioning.”

“Just Lionheart, eh?” Harper laughed.

“Well, maybe me, too.” Karl wiped sweat from his forehead and smiled. “Blame me?”

“I’m from Sphinx, too, remember?” Harper shook his head. But I am glad I caught you. Dean Charterman asked me to introduce Ms. Adair to you.” He indicated the woman beside him. “Stephanie, Karl, this is Gwendolyn Adair. Ms. Adair, Stephanie Harrington and Karl Zivonik.”

“I’m so glad to finally meet both of you!” Ms. Adair smiled, holding out her hand first to Karl and then to Stephanie. “I’ve heard a great deal about you—and about Lionheart, of course.” She smiled at the treecat on Stephanie’s shoulder. “He’s even more impressive looking in person than he is on HD.”

Stephanie smiled back, but it was difficult. She’d felt a sharp spasm of something very like wariness the instant Ms. Adair had come within fifty meters, and she knew where it had come from. Now she reached up to touch Lionheart’s ears.

“I don’t know about impressive looking,” she said, “but he’s always been pretty impressive to me.”

“I imagine so, given the circumstances under which you met.” Adair shook her head. “I’ve been to Sphinx for visits, but I’ve never met a hexapuma in the wild, and I never want to, either.”

“It isn’t the sort of thing we encourage,” Karl acknowledged. “Bad for tourism if too many tourists get eaten, after all.”

Adair laughed, and it was Harper’s turn to shake his head.

“Karl has what he thinks is a sense of humor, Ms. Adair. Despite that, he’s really a very nice guy, once you get to know him.”

Karl only smiled unrepentantly.

“At any rate,” Harper went on, “the Dean wanted me to make sure you three got introduced to one another. Ms. Adair’s cousin is the Earl of Adair Hollow, one of the University’s more generous donors, and she’s been very active in supporting the University herself. She’s also one of the directors of the Adair Foundation.”

He looked at them expectantly, and Stephanie glanced at Karl to see if he’d recognized the name. She’d done her own research on the Adair Foundation after viewing Anders’ and Jessica’s accounts of their meetings with the “x-a’s,” and from everything she’d been able to discover, the Foundation was about as respectable and reputable as nonprofit organizations came. Its list of donors and patrons read like a Who’s Who of the Manticoran aristocracy—including the King—and it had a distinguished record of aggressively protecting the biodiversity of the Star Kingdom’s habitable planets.

She’d felt reassured as she read over its charter and viewed the catalog of its accomplishments. Yet despite that reassurance, she’d still felt…uneasy. She knew she tended to be protective, maybe even overly protective, where the treecats were concerned, but it wasn’t like Anders and Jessica to imagine things, especially with Valiant along to keep them straight. If they had their doubts about some of the x-a’s, they probably had a reason, and there’d been no information on the Foundation’s site—or anywhere else in the public record—about how exactly it had decided which visiting xeno-anthropologists to sponsor to Sphinx.

The corner of Karl’s right eyelid dropped in what might have been the smallest of winks, and Stephanie suppressed a sudden smile. Yes, Karl had recognized the name. In fact, Stephanie was willing to bet he’d guessed who Ms. Adair was associated with the instant Harper had introduced her. That was probably what had prompted his remark about hexapumas and tourists.

“I’ve heard about the Foundation, Ms. Adair,” she said. “I’ve been messaging with a couple of our friends back on Sphinx about the expedition it sponsored.”

“Oh, I wish we could take the credit for that,” Adair said. She had a melodious contralto voice, and the gleam in those green eyes invited them to laugh with her. “Unfortunately, honesty compels me to admit that we only expedited it. I wish we’d been the ones who thought of it—and a lot sooner than this—but, well—”

She shrugged, her expression wry.

“Sooner than this?” Karl repeated, and Adair nodded.

“We’re dedicated to recognizing and protecting biodiversity. It’s what we do. Most people aren’t that worried about things like that just this moment, given three entire planets that are basically still empty of humans, but the Foundation figures it’s only a matter of time before humanity starts really extending its footprint here in the Manticore System. We’re already doing that on Manticore itself, you know, and it won’t be so many more years before the same thing begins happening on Sphinx. You would’ve thought that an organization worried about things like that would have been on its toes enough to immediately recognize what Stephanie’s discovery of the treecats meant—or might mean—for our declared mission, but frankly we were asleep at the switch. We should have sponsored a reputable xeno-anthropologist instead of letting that horrible Bolgeo person slip past us. For that matter, we should have insisted on vetting his credentials better, in which case that whole mess might not have happened.

“But we were too focused on what we were doing here on Manticore, I suppose. And by the time we realized just how bad a choice ‘Doctor’ Bolgeo had been, the Interior Ministry and Governor Donaldson had written a contract with a reputable, properly credentialed team from Urako. We decided the situation was properly in hand, but then there was that whole incident this past year’s fire season. To be honest, we began to feel…concerned over the future of the Whitaker expedition, and until the status of Dr. Whitaker’s contract was fully resolved the entire treecat situation was in limbo.

“Frankly, we’ve let some other people steal a march on us. By the time we started to worry, the Star Kingdom Chamber of Commerce, the Scientific Association of Manticore, the Royal Institute, and at least three or four other private and public organizations had already come to the conclusion that we needed to broaden and deepen the scope of our study of the treecats. In fact, they’d begun raising funds to bring in additional xeno-anthropologists before we ever got involved. We’re a stakeholder ourselves, of course, but our financial participation is relatively minor. Our biggest real contribution has been to facilitate the arrangements and to work with the University and the Ministry to assist in vetting Dr. Radzinsky’s entire team’s credentials and background, planning travel arrangements, and, to be honest, opening a few doors for them here in the Star Kingdom and integrating them into a noncompetitive relationship with Dr. Whitaker and his team.”

“I can only assume you’ve never met Dr. Whitaker,” Karl said dryly. Adair cocked an eyebrow at him, and he shrugged. “He’s actually a really nice guy in a lot of ways,” he said. “But where academic discovery’s concerned, he’s about as ‘noncompetitive’ as a pair of starving hexapumas with a single range bunny.”

“Oh, he’s not that bad, Karl!” Stephanie protested with a laugh, and Adair chuckled appreciatively.

“Trust me, even if he is, he won’t be the first academic I’ve met who feels that way. No offense, Allen,” she added with a glance at Dean Charterman’s assistant.

“You do realize I spend virtually all of my time here on this campus, don’t you?” Harper responded. “Trust me, I’ve had the range bunny’s perspective on scholarly hexapumas just like Dr. Whitaker at quite a few faculty get-togethers.”

“Exactly.” Adair turned back to Stephanie. “The truth is, one of the main reasons the Foundation got involved—even at this late date—was to try to…smooth out some of the bumps where academic egos were involved. Obviously, we believe there’s no such thing as too much knowledge about the treecats. That goes without saying. And the more people we have looking, the more perspectives we have, the more we’re likely to learn. But at the same time, we have to limit our intrusiveness. Whatever else may be true of the treecats, they’re the original owners of Sphinx, and we owe them a certain courtesy when we come visit. More to the point, we want to avoid contaminating the culture or over stressing their society. The last thing we need to do is to be crashing in with competing teams of scientists who might—with the best possible intentions—do a great deal of damage to the treecats out of pure ignorance simply because we haven’t had enough time to learn some critical truth about them.”

Her expression was far graver now, and Stephanie felt herself nodding in response.

“Bringing in those additional perspectives and viewpoints is important, but it was equally important to us to have everyone…under one roof, I suppose. And with enough direct Forestry Service involvement to preclude another Bolgeo slipping by us.”

“I see what you mean,” Stephanie said. “And I certainly agree that the last thing Lionheart or his family needs is to have hordes of strangers tromping all over their territories! I’d really prefer not to have brought in still more scientists, to be honest, but I do see your point, and I appreciate the way you’re trying to look out for the ’cats.”

“It’s the least we can do,” Adair told her. “And that brings me to why I asked Dean Charterman to provide an introduction to you. Allen here is more concerned with rocks than with trees and birds—or treecats—but given your status with the SFS, and especially your relationship with Lionheart, the Foundation would be very interested in hearing your impressions of how well the human presence on Sphinx is interacting with the native ecology. And, of course,” she looked at Lionheart across Stephanie’s shoulder, “how humans on Sphinx are reacting to the discovery of the treecats. We’re all aware that’s going to become a major issue in the not too distant future, and we’d appreciate all the insight we can get into it is early as possible. We know you’re only here on Manticore for your coursework here at the University, but we’d really hate to miss the opportunity to pick your brain on something like this while we’ve got the chance.”

Stephanie felt herself tighten a bit more internally, the way she always did when the issue of the ’cats’ future was brought front and center, but there was a lot of sense in what Adair had just said. Not that recognizing that fact did much about the sense of wariness flowing into her from Lionheart.

“I hope it won’t become a major issue,” she heard herself say.

“So do we,” Adair assured her, “but we can’t pretend the human race has an unblemished record where aboriginal species are involved. Which is why we’d like to invite the two of you to attend the Foundation’s monthly dinner this coming Tuesday as our guests. Most of the Directors will be present, and with your permission, we’d like to invite some of our more generous donors—and some members of the Star Kingdom’s business community who it couldn’t hurt to get on the treecats’ side—and ask you to possibly give a brief presentation on the treecats and then take a few questions.”

“The two of us?” Stephanie asked, and Adair grimaced.

“I know. I know! Here we want to talk about treecats, and we’re not even asking you to bring Lionheart along, which is dumb. Unfortunately, we didn’t realize you were on planet until last week, and we’ve run into a problem with the restaurant where we always meet. They aren’t prepared to allow a treecat on their premises…yet.” Her eyes glinted. “We’re working on them, and I don’t think they’re going to be raising any objections by the time we’re done with them, but we won’t be able to get it resolved before this month’s dinner. Hopefully, by next month, we’ll have them sorted out and be able to invite Lionheart, as well, before both of you have to head home to Sphinx again.”

“I see.” Stephanie looked at Karl, who shrugged. Then she reached up to caress Lionheart’s ears. “I imagine we could be there,” she said after a moment. “Assuming our class load lets us, anyway.”

“Oh, I think you could count on the Dean to run interference for you in this case,” Harper assured her. “If it was necessary…which it won’t be.”

“In that case, we’d be happy to accept, Ms. Adair.”

“Good!” Adair smiled brilliantly. “The entire Board will be delighted to hear that, Stephanie, and I’m personally looking forward to a very interesting and informative evening.”

* * *

When Anders saw Jessica’s ID on his uni-link, he almost didn’t take the call. By this point, he’d had enough of the x-a’s and dreaded the thought of another interview. Still, if he was dreading it, how might Valiant feel?”

“Hi, Jess. What’s up?”

“Hey, Anders. Toby and I scored some free tickets to an open air concert in one of the parks outside Twin Forks. We were wondering if you wanted to come. We could swing by and pick you up.”

Anders didn’t even pause. “You mean an outing that has nothing to do with treecats and their technology—or lack of technology, or whether or not they can communicate on a sophisticated level? I’m in!”

“Don’t you even want to know what sort of music it is?”

“I don’t care. Even monotone ding-jow would be a welcome break from anthropological sniping. When can you bust me outta here?”

Jessica giggled. “The concert starts just after lunch.”

“Then let me buy you lunch first—and Toby, too. Can you get away that early?”

“Sure. Mom and I juggled schedules.”

As it turned out, the music was really good—at least from a human perspective. Shortly after the concert started, though, Valiant pressed his true-hands to his ears.

“They must be using some sort of frequency he finds annoying,” Toby guessed when Jessica grinned ruefully, then carried the treecat off.

She hurried back just a few minutes later.

“I took Valiant to the edge of the field. We’re not so far from home that he can’t make his own way back. I suspect he’ll take his time and do some botanizing along the way. He brought a carry net and some sample bags.”

The first band—the one that had so annoyed Valiant—was definitely of the high-brow, sit-and-listen sort, but most of the ones that followed encouraged the audience members to join in in some way. Anders found himself dancing with people he didn’t know, laughing as they tried out unfamiliar steps. More than once, he danced with Jessica. That was really nice. Stephanie wasn’t much of a dancer.

When Jess had said “she and Toby” had gotten tickets, Anders had wondered if there might be a bit of romance going on. But if Toby’s interested in anyone, it’s that cute little redhead, he thought. I think I’ve seen her watching the hang-gliding club’s demos. I wonder if he has an admirer?

The crisp chill of the Sphinxian autumn evening brought the concert to an end. Jessica dropped Toby off first, then glanced at the HUD.

“Want to have dinner at my house? I helped Mom with prep this morning, so I know there’s plenty. Dr. Marjorie asked Mom to help herself from the greenhouses. Otherwise, lots of stuff would go to waste. The freeze-unit’s filled to bursting.”

“You’re sure it’ll be all right?”

“I sort of hinted to Mom this morning, but I’ll double-check, just so you can read her ‘yes’ yourself. So you’ll come?”

“Absolutely! But swing by the Red Letter Café. I’ll get a box of those iced pastries to sweeten my welcome.”

“Oh…That’s not necessary. You’re sweet enough.” Jessica blushed to the roots of her hair. “I mean you’re welcome without the bribe.”

Anders found himself coloring. “Seriously. Take it from the son of an x-a. Guests bearing desert are always more welcome.”

He commed his dad and left a message, saying he’d be back later. When he came back to Jessica’s car after buying a large box of the promised pastries, he found her ending the call. She held out her uni-link so he could read the final text.

“You’re very welcome for dinner,” she said. “Mom and Dad haven’t gotten home yet, but they’ll be back soon. Right now, the twins, Melanie-Anne and Archie, are in charge. Mom has Tiddles and Nathan with her.”

Anders and Stephanie were both only children. They’d shared their amazement at the disorganized but somehow still functional amoeba that was Jessica’s large family. Actually, though, on Sphinx such large families were more usual than their mutual status as “onlies.” Stephanie said her parents hoped to add a child or two, but so far the time hadn’t seemed right. She’d been pretty philosophical about it.

“Actually, I’m almost out the door,” she’d said when Anders asked her how she felt about it. “College in a couple of years. After that, well, I’d really like to take some posts on parts of Sphinx I don’t know as well. There’s a lot of this world I want to experience firsthand.”

Anders was wondering if he’d feel as calm if his parents suddenly presented him with a younger brother or sister when he heard Jessica draw in her breath.

“Hang on,” she said, reaching for the controls. “There’s an air car down there I don’t recognize. The twins know they aren’t supposed to let strangers in, but Melanie-Anne in particular is just too trusting. Still, I’d rather not cause a fuss. I’ll bring us down on the back lot and we can walk in without being noticed.”

She pulled off the maneuver with such skill—and so quietly—that Anders entertained the thought that Jessica might have found it convenient to go in and out without being noticed from time to time.

Or am I just being suspicious? In a house with so many little kids, it’s probably second nature to find ways to avoid waking the baby.

“Valiant’s not back yet,” Jessica said softly as she opened the air car door. “He’s on his way.”

Evening chill had driven everyone inside. Jessica led the way around the side of the rambling house. Anders had been here many times with Stephanie and knew enough of the basic layout to know they were heading for a side door that led into a corridor that bisected the front and back portions of the house. It was a good choice. They could enter without being seen and hear whatever was being said in most of the house.

Jessica slid the door open and motioned him inside quickly. Anders was immediately struck by the relative quiet. The Pheriss house was never quiet—too many people lived there for that to be the case—but this evening the usual lively ruckus was subdued. Music was playing somewhere, but no feet were thundering up and down the stairs, nor was cutlery clattering in the kitchen areas.

Instead, from the front of the house where there was as close to a formal living room as existed, an adult male voice was speaking. A moment later, it was answered by a piping childish voice that Anders thought belonged to Archie, the male half of the twins. They couldn’t make out the words, but everything sounded calm enough, and Anders felt his shoulders relaxing from a tension he hadn’t realized was there.

Jessica held a slim finger to her lips and motioned for Anders to follow her. Stepping over scattered toys, they went down the corridor toward the front of the house and paused outside the living room door.

The man’s voice said, “So you’ve never felt threatened, even though you’ve heard that treecats are meat-eaters?”

“No,” Melanie-Anne said thoughtfully. “Our dogs, Otis and Mookie, are meat-eaters, but we’re not scared of them.”

“Otis and Mookie,” corrected a younger voice—Billiam?—pedantically, “eat kibbles. Valiant thinks kibbles are yucky. He ate a chipmunk. I saw him. He ate it all up.”

“And did that upset you?” the man asked. “Some people keep chipmunks for pets because they’re cute.”

The voice was familiar. In a moment, Anders placed it: Duff DeWitt, assistant to Dr. Radzinsky. Just the other day, Dad had said something about him…what was it? Right!

“I wonder what sort of connections that DeWitt fellow has. He’s certainly not the best anthropologist I’ve met, not even close. Radzinsky must’ve picked him for some other reason.”

DeWitt was a good-looking man with his fair hair, dark eyes, impressive musculature, and chiseled features. The leer in Dad’s tone of voice had made it perfectly clear what reason he thought Cleonora Radzinsky had for bringing DeWitt along. At the time, Anders had dismissed his scorn for the other man as yet another example of Dad’s professional cattiness, but now he wondered if Dad might have been right. Certainly, this wasn’t a professional way to conduct an interview! All Jessica’s siblings were younger than her—definitely too young to be interviewed without their parents present—and these were certainly leading questions.

Billiam, bless him, was prattling happily on about how Valiant’s choice of a meal hadn’t bothered him at all. In fact, he seemed to have taken a childish delight in the fact that Valiant had “even gulped down the guts!”

Anders expected Jessica—who’d shown herself at least as fearless as Stephanie in her own way—to go charging in to defend Valiant’s character, but she hung back. Then she glanced at him, and when Anders saw the deep lines of worry etching her face, he instantly realized what held her back.

Defending Valiant would imply that there’s something to defend him against. Jessica—and me, too—would be just about the worst people to interrupt, because we’re known to like treecats. DeWitt would find some way of twisting it to his advantage, I’m sure.

He reached for Jessica’s hand and tapped the uni-link strapped to her wrist. “Go and make a call,” he mouthed. “Interrupt that way.”

Jessica nodded. She could have texted, but it was likely that the absorbed group would ignore that. However, with both parents out, it was unlikely the Pheriss kids would ignore the signal of an incoming call.

She was moving toward the back of the house when a very unlikely knight came to the rescue. There was the sound of the front door—which opened into a small foyer directly off the living room—opening. Buddy Pheriss’ booted feet could be heard striding in.

“Who are you, young man? And what are you doing in my house?”

Jessica pointed to where a slight change of angle would permit them to watch the action in the living room in the reflection cast onto one of the many windows. DeWitt rose smoothly to his feet, apparently not in the least flustered, and held out his hand to Mr. Pheriss. Buddy Pheriss was a big, wiry man who made his living doing an assortment of jobs, many of them involving physical labor. Currently, he wore a beard that jutted out in a point and his dark auburn hair—as curly as his daughter’s—was longer than the current fashion. He looked rather wild, but DeWitt didn’t seem in the least intimidated.

“I’m Duff DeWitt, Dr. Radzinsky’s assistant. I called earlier and was told I could come by and talk to your family about life with a treecat.”

“And who gave permission?” The rumbling growl was addressed to the assorted children, and Melanie-Anne raised a tentative hand.

“I guess I did, Dad. I mean, he asked if anyone here knew anything about treecats and could talk to him. I didn’t realize he was coming over, but when he did….”

She trailed off.

“Ah.” The monosyllable promised repercussions later, but Mr. Pheriss wasn’t distracted.

“Mr. DeWitt, you may not have realized it, but the front window has a cracked pane. Landlord keeps forgetting to fix it, and it’s become an issue, so I won’t.”

Anders grinned. The Pheriss’ landlords were the same Franchittis Stephanie so deeply despised.

“So I just happened to hear what you were asking my children. Quite a lot of what you were asking them actually. That bit where you showed them the diagram of a treecat’s teeth was very interesting. So was the bit where you stressed how hard their claws are and how very many they have. Not exactly scientific, now, was that?”

DeWitt blinked. If he’d researched the Pheriss family at all, he’d obviously made the mistake of thinking that lack of formal education was the same as lack of brains. From the expression that flickered across his handsome features, he’d just realized that he’d made a major error.

The next few minutes were quite interesting from the observers’ point of view—especially since those observers could now be assured that Duff DeWitt was not going to leave the Pheriss household with any juicy soundbites regarding vicious treecats. Not only did Mr. Pheriss make certain that DeWitt had been recording the conversation—Billiam was quite helpful there—but he thought to make certain that not only did the whole the record get wiped, but so did the backup being made by DeWitt’s uni-link.

“I’ll be talking to your boss, young man, about scientific methods and ethical treatment of minors as subjects,” Mr. Pheriss concluded as he ushered his unwelcome guest out the door. “I will indeed. Can’t have the sample ruined, now, can we? I might even mention what I think of the sort of bottom-feeding, slime-sucking scum dogs who would frighten small children. But if you leave quietly, I might keep that to myself.”

When DeWitt, wrath lighting his dark eyes, had departed, Mr. Pheriss called out, “Well, you might as well get out here, Jessica. And that young man, too. Before your mama gets home for dinner, we’re going to have a scavenger hunt to make sure our fine visitor didn’t leave behind any other devices. Always pays to play it safe, at least that’s how I see it…”

Jessica barreled out of her concealment and hugged her father. Anders followed more slowly, thinking hard.

Now I think I understand why—despite needing to move all the time—this family works. When it all comes down to it, they can count on each other. Here I’d been pitying Jessica, but now—Now I think I actually envy her.

* * *

The Charleston Arms was the fanciest restaurant Stephanie had ever seen. In fact, it was fancy enough to make even her a little nervous. Her mom had insisted that she pack at least one “good outfit,” although Stephanie was always most comfortable in the sort of clothes better suited to knocking around the bush. At the moment, she was glad her mother had been so inflexible on that point, but she was pretty sure her notion of “good outfit” fell a light-year or so short of the Charleston Arms’ standards.

She knew from her own experience on Sphinx that newly settled worlds tended towards lower buildings, without the hundreds of floors a proper tower might possess, but the Charleston Arms was ridiculous. Set in the midst of its own four-hectare expanse of meticulously landscaped grounds, it favored what its public site had called “neoclassic architecture,” although Stephanie couldn’t quite figure out which neoclassic style it had followed. It was no more than three floors tall, its roof was covered in red tile, its walls were made of native Manticoran granite, and its façade was fringed with tall, fluted columns whose bases were almost as thick as Stephanie was tall. It was the sort of place which simply reeked of wealth, power, and prestige, and despite the imposing sweep of its clear, clean lines, something about it set her teeth on edge the instant she saw it.

Probably just the fact that the people who run it won’t let you bring Lionheart, she reminded herself. So remember to be polite!

The incredibly superior live human who insisted on opening the taxi’s door as if Stephanie and Karl were incapable of such a complicated and demanding task managed—somehow—not to sniff audibly at their ragamuffin appearance, but it was obviously hard. She retaliated by smiling up at him sweetly as he escorted the two of them up the broad, shallow steps into the restaurant proper. She couldn’t decide if he was more worried that they’d get lost or that they might decide to steal the antique doorknobs if he didn’t keep an eye on them.

The interior had exactly the sort of wood-paneled walls, polished marble floors, and ever so quiet and discrete background music she might have anticipated, and she found herself beginning to wonder just how much she could possibly have in common with the Adair Foundation if this was where it regularly held its meetings. She was just beginning to think about beating a strategic retreat to the taxi when someone called her name.

“Stephanie! I’m so glad you and Karl could join us tonight,” Gwendolyn Adair said. She swept across the gleaming stone floor towards them, tall and beautiful in a “casual” little gown which had probably cost more than the Harrington air car, and smiled hugely. “I’m sorry you had to come by taxi. If you’d screened me the Foundation would’ve been delighted to arrange to have you picked up.”

“We managed just fine, thank you.” Stephanie smiled again, politely, though she was tempted to point out that she and Karl were perfectly capable of finding their way around the Sphinx bush on their own. The terror of finding an air taxi was probably something they were prepared to face when they absolutely had to.

“Well, now that you’re here, let me show you the way to our dining room.” Gwendolyn wrinkled her nose with a charming little smile. “Personally, I think they were a little too concerned with making certain people would be properly impressed with the establishment’s grandeur when they built this place. You need GPS just to find your way around inside it!

There was so much rich amusement in her tone that Stephanie found herself smiling back at her again, much more naturally this time. She glanced up at Karl and saw him smiling, as well, as Gwendolyn somehow made their escort/keeper disappear without saying a word. Then she turned and led the two of them across that sea of polished marble, through an arch, down two flights of shallow steps, around a corner, down a hall, up a flight of steps, through an atrium with its own private grove of exotic ornamental trees and flowering shrubs, past a koi pond, and—finally!—through another door into a cozy little dining room which probably couldn’t have seated more than three or four hundred of Stephanie’s closest friends.

It was a journey which could make even Stephanie feel more than a little out of her depth.

Floor-to-ceiling windows looked out over a small, beautiful lake on the restaurant’s grounds, and the setting sun hung directly above it, pouring down a rich, golden light. A lectern had been set up at one end of the dining room, forming a small, bare island among the ice floes of tables draped in white linen tablecloths and glittering with silverware and crystal glasses. A couple of dozen people were already present, waiting for them. The attendees seemed almost lost in that enormous room and (she noted glumly) just about every one of them was as elegantly dressed as Gwendolyn.

“Hey, don’t sweat it,” a voice said very quietly in her ear, and she glanced up from the corner of her eye as Karl smiled down at her. “You’re the one they’re all here to see and listen to, Steph,” he added, and gave her shoulder a gentle smack.

She smiled back up at him, then turned and followed Gwendolyn calmly out into the banquet room’s splendor.

* * *

“And now, ladies and gentlemen,” Gwendolyn Adair announced the better part of two hours later, “it gives me considerable pleasure to present Stephanie Harrington!”

She smiled from her place at the lectern, inviting Stephanie to join her, and the seated diners applauded enthusiastically as Stephanie rose. The introduction wasn’t strictly necessary, given the fact that she and Karl had already been introduced to a seemingly endless array of rich, aristocratic, and rich and aristocratic people. Still, the applause was heavier than Stephanie had expected it would be, and she felt an undeniable little stir of pleasure as it greeted her. At the same time, she felt a matching irritation that she was the only one being invited up to speak to them. Karl had been just as involved with the SFS—and with protecting the ’cats—as she had, but the Adair Foundation (just like everyone else in the Star Kingdom) seemed fixated on the drama of her original meeting with Lionheart.

Well, the “original meeting” they all know about, anyway, she corrected herself, remembering a thunderstorm and a small celery thief in the rain.

The applause continued until she joined Gwendolyn on the small stage, then died away, and Gwendolyn continued.

“I know all of you are familiar with the news reports about Stephanie and Lionheart, and I’m sure all of you are as irked as I am that he couldn’t join us as well tonight. However, since you do know the public parts of their story, I think we can skip the usual flowery introductions and get right down to the real reason all of us are here tonight.” She looked at Stephanie. “I thought it might be a good idea to ask you to tell us a little about what treecats are really like and then, if you don’t mind, take a few questions from the floor, Stephanie.”

“Sure.” Stephanie smiled back at her just a bit more confidently than she actually felt, then stepped up behind the lectern and adjusted the mic more comfortably to her height as Gwendolyn returned to her own chair.

“First,” she began, “let me thank all of you for inviting Karl and me to join you this evening.” She emphasized Karl’s name ever so slightly and saw several people glance in his direction. “And, like Gwendolyn, I’m sorry Lionheart can’t be her as well. He’s actually a much better spokesman for the ’cats than I could ever be…even if he can’t talk.”

A quiet rumble of amusement answered her last remark, and she drew a deep, unobtrusive breath. Now for the tricky part, she reminded herself. It was time to enlist these people in the ’cats’ support, but she had to do it in a way that made them eager to protect Lionheart and the others without over-emphasizing their intelligence.

“When I first met Lionheart, I was doing something really stupid,” she began, “and if he hadn’t come along, I wouldn’t be here today. I guess that means I’m probably a little prejudiced in his favor, and that makes me very happy to have the chance to talk to an organization like the Adair Foundation about him and the rest of the treecats. We’re obviously only beginning to really learn about them, and it’s going to be years and years before anyone’s ready to provide any kind of definitive evaluation of them. But one thing that’s already clear is that they were on Sphinx a long time before we were, and that’s why the SFS has declared them a protected species. That’s only a provisional status, though. It’s subject to being changed or revoked, and Karl and I both think that would be a really bad idea. I hope that after this evening, you’ll agree with us, because we can use all the help we can get making sure the ’cats are protected the same way they protected me against the hexapuma.”

She heard the quiet sincerity in her own voice and, looking out at her audience, she thought she saw it reflected in attentive expressions and cocked, listening heads. She hoped so, anyway.

“That afternoon,” she went on, “when my hang-glider crashed into the crown oak, I had no idea what was going to happen. I thought—”

Chapter Eleven

“Well, I have to admit I’m glad that’s over with,” Stephanie admitted several hours later as Gwendolyn Adair and Oswald Morrow, who she’d introduced as one of her cousin the Earl’s financial managers, accompanied her and Karl back towards the waiting taxi. “Talking to that many people made me a lot more nervous than I expected it to!”

“Really?” Gwendolyn tilted her head, looking down at her. “I don’t think anyone would have suspected that looking at you. In fact, I thought you handled that extraordinarily well. Didn’t you, Oswald?”

“I didn’t see any signs of anxiety,” Morrow agreed. “And I thought you handled the questions quite well, too.”

“And…shrewdly,” Gwendolyn said. Stephanie looked back at her quickly, and the older woman smiled faintly. “I hope you won’t take this wrongly, Stephanie, but it was pretty apparent to me that you chose your words rather carefully a time or two. You’re very protective of the treecats, aren’t you?”

“Well, maybe I am.” Stephanie tried not to bristle. “I think I’ve got pretty good reasons to be, though!”

She felt one of Karl’s big hands settle on her shoulder and squeeze gently, and she made herself relax muscles that had tried to tighten up.

“Of course you do,” Gwendolyn agreed calmly. “That was an observation, not a criticism. I happen to think you’re entirely correct to be protective of them—that’s what the Adair Foundation’s all about, isn’t it?—and I meant it as a compliment. I don’t know where the final judgment on treecat sentience is going to fall in the end, but I thoroughly agree that this is a time to go slowly and carefully. The last thing any of us want to see on Sphinx is a repeat of what happened on Barstool.”

An icicle touched Stephanie’s heart at the reminder of the Amphors of the planet Barstool and how they’d been exterminated by the human settlers of their home world to prevent anyone from suggesting that it belonged to them and not the human interlopers. The hand on her shoulder tightened again, this time as much in comfort as in warning, and she made herself meet Gwendolyn’s green eyes levelly.

“No, we don’t,” she heard herself agree calmly. “And you’re right—thinking about things like Barstool does make me kind of careful about how enthusiastically I talk about the ’cats. Oh, I know it’s early to be worrying about things like that in Sphinx’s case, especially with the Forestry Service looking out for them and especially when there’s no way we can demonstrate how intelligent they really are. I do worry about it, though. I owe Lionheart too much to just stand around and watch something bad happen to him or the rest of the treecats.”

“Of course you do,” Gwendolyn acknowledged as they reemerged from the Charleston Arms into the warm, breezy night of the city of Landing, where the taxi waited on the parking apron. “It couldn’t be any other way, and I’m glad—I’m sure the entire Foundation is glad—they have such a good friend in you. And in Karl and the rest of the SFS, of course.”

Stephanie smiled brightly at her, then held out her hand.

“Thanks! And I’m glad the Foundation’s on their side, too!” she said, shaking Gwendolyn’s hand firmly. “I wish we could stay to talk about them some more, but Karl and I have a nine o’clock exam in the morning, and I just know a certain ’cat is going to be waiting to demand an extra stalk of celery when we get back to the dorms!”

* * *

“We are so screwed,” Oswald Morrow remarked quietly as he and Gwendolyn Adair watched the taxi lift away.

“She is rather more personable—and formidable—than I’d expected out of someone her age,” Gwendolyn agreed. “I knew she had to be tough and determined just to have survived the hexapuma, and it was obvious she was smart as they come, too. But she’s a lot calmer and more collected than I thought she’d be. She didn’t even turn a hair talking to the Foundation members, did she?”

“Not that anyone might notice.” Morrow grimaced. “The newsies are going to just love her the instant she starts giving interviews, you know. Smart, cute, tough, mature—she’s a PR campaign’s worst nightmare, Gwen! If she starts handing out interviews like the little talk she gave tonight, but with the treecat sitting on her shoulder and looking just as cute—and tough, with all those scars and the missing leg!—we’re going to have every gooey-hearted idiot in the Star Kingdom pulling for the little monsters. And if that happens, you can kiss all those land options on Sphinx goodbye. Parliament’ll grandfather in those little beasties’ claim to the planet, and their market value will drop straight into the basement.”

“You do have a dazzling grasp of the obvious, don’t you, Ozzie?” Gwendolyn observed acidly. “Of course the options’ values will tank if that happens! Unless I’m mistaken, that’s the very thing you and I are trying to prevent, now isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is,” Morrow replied tartly. “And at the moment, I’m thinking things don’t look too good in that respect.”

“Maybe not. But that was always a possibility, wasn’t it? What do you hear from Dr. Radzinsky?”

“Nothing good,” Morrow said glumly. “She says the evidence is pretty clear that they’re not just tool-users but also toolmakers, and probably even more advanced toolmakers than we were afraid they were.” He shook his head. “She’s not going to be able to convince the academic community they aren’t sentient, Gwen. Not for very long, anyway. And I think she’s a lot less optimistic than she was about convincing people their sentience is minimal, too.”

“I wish I could say I was surprised.” Gwendolyn gazed thoughtfully after the vanished lights of the taxi and pursed her lips. “So unless we can come up with some sort of pesticide that’ll kill only treecats without bothering the rest of the ecosystem, it looks like we’re stuck with them.”

Morrow glanced at her profile a bit uneasily. He thought she was only joking about exterminating the ’cats, but it was always a little hard to be certain about Gwendolyn. He’d realized some years ago that she was actually far more ruthless than he was once she’d fully committed to an operation…and she had more of her own portfolio invested in those Sphinx land options than he’d thought she did.

“Well,” she sighed after a moment, “if we are, we are. I know the others are going to insist on trying for the ‘only animals’ solution, but you’re right; it’s not going to fly in the end. That doesn’t mean we can’t get most of what we want, though. I think it’s time you and I started concentrating on Plan B. At least that way we can limit the damage.”

Morrow grunted unhappily. She was almost certainly right about that, but she had a point about “the others.” The real moneymakers behind their efforts weren’t going to be happy if any of the land on which they held options was snatched out from under them and handed back to the treecats. Nor were they going to be very happy with the people—like one Oswald Morrow—who’d allowed that to happen.

“Frampton and the others will scream,” he said warningly.

“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.

<Gone! And gone beyond the range of my mind-voice.>

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.

<Which way did he go?> Keen Eyes asked.

<How should I know?> Sour Belly’s thoughts were as unpleasant as his breath. <You are the scout. I am just a retired hunter turned caretaker of kittens.>

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 <I see, sister. 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 has 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.

All of these worried Keen Eyes. They indicated haste and carelessness, neither of which boded well for the Person he pursued. Then, too, though he called repeatedly after his friend, there was no reply, not even the faintest flicker of a mind-glow. True, Red Cliff could be out of range. Since the fires, there were fewer People to relay messages than there would have been in the past. Nonetheless, Keen Eyes’ heart hammered hard in apprehension.

Keen Eyes knew when he crossed into the heart of the Trees Enfolding Clan’s range. He’d known he had been in what a stiff-tail like Swimmer’s Scourge would call that clan’s territory practically from the start. Now, however, there could be no claiming ignorance. He’d passed—and avoided—snares set for bark-chewers along the limbs of the netwood. He’d seen pads made from leaves and branches set in convenient areas where a hunter might wait in stillness for prey animals to become convinced the forest was still and safe. He’d seen the spring, its tiny natural basin sculpted into a perfect pool. These, and a dozen other reworkings of the landscape, told him that People lived here.

Still his calls, kept as tight and directed as possible in the hope that he could avoid the attention of the Trees Enfolding Clan, met with no answer. Only a passionate desire to find Red Cliff and convince him to go home to his mate and kittens kept Keen Eyes searching. He was about to give up when he smelled blood—not prey blood, but Person blood—and mingled with that horrid reek was the odor of fear.

Without considering the consequences, Keen Eyes bounded towards the scent. Even if it wasn’t Red Cliff, to bleed so heavily a Person must be in danger. Any Person, no matter the clan, would come to offer aid. But when he burst into the clearing at the heart of a cluster of netwood trees, Keen Eyes found no Person, only a patch of earth soaked with blood and ornamented with tufts of fur. This close to the source, Keen Eyes could have no doubt whose blood it was: Red Cliff’s.

Red Cliff was sorely wounded or—more likely—dead. Intent on keeping hope alive, Keen Eyes sought for any trace of Red Cliff’s mind-glow, but found nothing. He reminded himself that this did not necessarily mean the other Person was dead. The range over which People could sense each other’s mind-glows was much smaller than that over which they could speak. However, this did mean one of two things. Either Red Cliff was dead or so close to dead that his mind-glow had all but vanished. Or Red Cliff had managed to escape, despite his wounds.

Keen Eyes sniffed the air, examining his surroundings carefully with the acute vision and sense for detail that had won him his adult name. Mingled in with Red Cliff’s own scent he found that of another Person. It was not a familiar scent in the sense that Keen Eyes had met the Person to whom it belonged face-to-face, but it was familiar in that he had encountered traces of it before. It belonged to someone who regularly hunted in this area, so probably a Person belonging to Trees Enfolding Clan.

Keen Eyes sought additional information, but it was curiously lacking. A skilled hunter learned how to conceal his scent trail. Keen Eyes wondered just who had been here with Red Cliff—and had he proved a friend who bore the injured Red Cliff away or the enemy who had wounded him?

<Looking for your friend?>

The mocking mind-voice was familiar: Swimmer’s Scourge! It did not wait for Keen Eyes to reply but went on in the same taunting fashion.

<I took him back where he belongs. If you want to find him, don’t look in our lands. Look in your own.>

<Was he alive? Did you get him help? How badly was he injured?>

But there was no answer. Nor, no matter how determinedly Keen Eyes cast about, could he find the faintest trace of another’s mind-glow. Swimmer’s Scourge must have moved out of range as soon as he had issued his challenge.

Briefly, Keen Eyes considered going after him, but his concern for Red Cliff won out. Gathering all six limbs under him, he raced along the interconnected limbs of the netwood trees, his tail flowing behind like a banner.

* * *

The first place Keen Eyes checked was where the Landless Clan currently had gathered. It was easy to tell Red Cliff had not returned, even without drawing attention to himself. If he had, the news would have shone in the mind-glows of those present.

Wanting to keep his fears to himself, Keen Eyes stayed in the vicinity of the camp for as little time as possible. The mocking words of Swimmer’s Scourge had repeated themselves over and over in Keen Eyes thoughts as he ran.

<I took him back where he belonged. If you want to find him, don’t look in our lands. Look in your own.>

Keen Eyes thought he knew what that meant. He even thought he knew where within the wider range to look. If Red Cliff had been taken “home,” it would be to where the burned lands touched the lands of Trees Enfolding Clan. He knew, too, that this almost certainly meant that Red Cliff was dead. However, he would not rest until he knew for certain.

Although enough time had passed since the fires for the foliage to begin to shift color in reaction to the cooler temperatures, the air nearest to the fire ravaged areas still stank of burned matter. For once, Keen Eyes hardly noticed the smell. He was seeking an odor even less welcome. Before too long, he found it.

Red Cliff lay reduced to a crumpled heap of bloodied and torn flesh and fur. His mind-glow had long gone silent and his heart ceased to beat. Bereft of the fierce intensity that had filled him since his mate had been injured, Red Cliff looked small and pathetic.

Reaching out a hesitant true-hand, Keen Eyes patted the still form, wishing there was some way he could forget this broken creature and remember his friend only as he had been. He wondered if Beautiful Mind knew her mate was dead. He suspected she did. Would he return to the camp to find she had given up her fragile hold on life? He had sensed no such thing when he had checked in, but often the process took longer, the remaining partner simply wasting away in a terrible misery.

So the Landless Clan—already small—had now been reduced by not one but two. Anger replaced sorrow in Keen Eyes heart. Swimmer’s Scourge—for even with the smell of death and ashes he could catch traces of the same scent he had found in the bloodied glade—must have guessed that Red Cliff had a mate. Perhaps he’d even seen her image in Red Cliff’s thoughts. Had Red Cliff begged? Begged for mercy? Begged for passage? Begged for food for his starving kits?

But Swimmer’s Scourge had shown no mercy. Worse, he had not only killed, he had made a cruel joke of his killing by moving Red Cliff’s body so that there would be no doubt that in life or in death the members of Landless Clan were not welcome in the lands of his clan.

Very well. No mercy. No passage. Not even a handful of roots or a couple of tough old bark-chewers to ease the slow starvation Landless Clan faced with the coming of winter. Swimmer’s Scourge had made his point clear. The search for a new home for the Landless Clan had become something far grimmer. This was a declaration of war.

Chapter Twelve

“All right,” Jessica said, straightening from the inspection of a hearty seedling. “That finishes this area. Mom’s going to go nova over what we’re finding. There’s always been a lot of interest in the way crown oak puts out broad leaves for spring and summer, then generates filament leaves for the winter months. From what we’ve seen today, I’m guessing they’re also very adaptable in fire recovery. No wonder they’re becoming the dominant tree in this region.”

“Definitely,” Anders agreed. “Where next? Another crown oak grove?”

Jessica shook her head, which caused her thick, wildly curly hair to toss very attractively around her face. She was apparently unaware of the appeal. With an annoyed sniff, she dug a band from one pocket and corralled the curly mass into an abundant ponytail.

“Nope. Both Mom and Dr.Marjorie are really curious about how picketwood handles fire. Dr.Marjorie was already studying picketwood, because it has some interesting disease control mechanisms. It’d have to since what looks to us like a whole grove is actually one tree with lots of trunks.”

“Weird,” Anders said. “But from what I’ve seen, really useful if you’re a treecat.”

“Exactly!” Jessica said, miming applause before she gathered up her collecting gear and started walking toward the air car. “The treecats are super-dependent on the picketwood. Aerial imaging’s shown that the groves cross mountains, go all over continents.”

“That means,” Anders said excitedly, loading various buckets and bags into the back of Jessica’s air car, “the treecats can travel just about anywhere.”

Valiant leapt gracefully into the front seat, then moved so he could sit on the back of the seat behind Jessica’s head. He made a bleeking sound and tugged at her ponytail, clearly protesting that the abundant massive hair was crowding him.

Jessica sighed and undid the ponytail, sweeping her curls into untidy order with the tips of her fingers. “I wish Valiant wanted to stick his head out the car window the way Lionheart does. Instead, he likes to snuggle. Sometimes I think I’m going to have to cut my hair all off—wear it really short, like Christine does.”

“Oh, don’t!” Anders protested impulsively, then felt himself color.

“What?” Jessica looked surprised at his vehemence, then laughed. “My hair’s just so inconvenient. It always was, but now that Valiant likes to sit on it….”

Anders swallowed his embarrassment and tried to sound casual. “Oh, I just…I mean, it looks really pretty. I like the curls. It wouldn’t look the same all short.”

Jessica laughed. “I know. It was short when I was small. Mom said I looked like an angel, but I think I looked more like a frizzly-leone.”

“Frizzly-leone?”

“It’s a sort of plant they have on Sankar. Seedpods as big as my head that stick out in little parasols. They come in pink and pale blue. I think they’d be really popular, but the seeds get everywhere so they’re considered a weed.”

Relieved—though he wasn’t sure why he was suddenly so flustered—Anders hurried to ask, “What makes something a weed, anyhow?”

Jessica’ explanation—that basically the difference had more to do with humans than with plants—effectively got them off the subject of her hair. Jessica went on to tell a story about the time her family had been so low that they were making a living by pulling weeds in some rich man’s garden.

“Dad’s client didn’t want the sound of machinery to intrude,” she said. “What he didn’t ever guess was that we were taking about half of what we pulled home and cooking it. He was pretty greedy, I bet he’d have tried to dock—”

She stopped and peered down, then glanced at the HUD.

“What’s wrong, Jess?”

“I thought I saw something moving down there, but I’m not sure. The zoom on this junker is busted. Did you see anything?”

“No. I’ve got to admit, all this burned forest gives me the creeps, so I wasn’t really looking. Was what you saw large?”

“Like a hexapuma or something? No. Probably just a near-otter or like that. Steph would know.”

“Yeah.” Anders felt the familiar pang. “She probably would, and—if she didn’t—she’d want to go after it and get some images.”

“Well, we’ll leave the poor critter be,” Jessica decided. “This is our last stop. Then I want to get home. Mom commed that she has medicine for Tiddles but, if I know her, she’s going to have worn herself out. She’ll need help.”

And your dad’s pretty useless for that, Anders thought. A nice guy, but useless or your family wouldn’t end up eating weeds.

He wondered why the thought should make him so angry. Jessica had clearly thought the idea of “stealing” the rich man’s weeds had been pretty funny. He was still trying to come to terms with the strength of his reactions when Jessica touched the air car down. Valiant, who’d been drowsing, woke up. All at once, he stiffened, gave a demanding bleek, and tapped the window.

Puzzled, Jessica opened the door. Valiant was out in a flash, loping over the burned ground in the direction of something that lay in a heap on the dirt. Jessica ran after him, then called back.

“Anders! It’s a treecat. I think it’s dead!”

* * *

Dirt Grubber awoke feeling distinctly unsettled. He had been dreaming of his gardens, inspecting the three different plantings side-by-side, as he never could do in reality. The plantings that grew within the protected confines of Plant Minder’s transparent plant place were larger and healthier than those that grew either near Windswept’s clan’s home or those that grew near Damp Ground’s central nesting place. Waking and sleeping, Dirt Grubber considered how to help those plants that must grow strong outside the shelter of the transparent plant place.

In his dream, he was sorting through the difficulties. The plantings near the bog were troubled by insects. He was considering the best way to protect them when, to his utter astonishment, the strong plants in the transparent plant place lifted off the roof, reached over, and began to rip the other plants out of the ground. The other plants fought back. Faced with two opponents, even the stronger plants could not escape injury. The destruction was horrible.

When Windswept touched the flying thing down, Dirt Grubber awoke. He felt very happy when he realized his plants were safe, that their destruction had been only a terrible dream.

He barely had a moment to enjoy his relief before his mind—reflexively searching the area as he always did when they arrived at a new place—touched that of another Person. The mind-glow Dirt Grubber encountered was dark and violent. If mind-glows had come in colors, this one would have been the purple-black of thunderheads.

<Who? What is wrong? How can I help you?> Dirt Grubber reached for the other Person and felt himself repelled by the force of the other’s anger.

He tapped the flying thing’s transparent side panel and Windswept let him free of the confined space. When he landed on the bare earth, he felt the brittleness of cinders beneath his feet. Without pause, he ran in the direction from which he tasted the other’s mind-glow. Before he reached it, he came upon the body of another Person.

Dirt Grubber stood aghast, sending forth his query once more, this time not relying upon words, but instead projecting a heartfelt desire to give whatever help this stranger required of him.

<I am beyond help.> Pain and desperation now tinted the purple anger with lightning streaks of dark green and deep indigo. <My clanmate is dead. Our clan is doomed. There is nothing left for us but death. Keep away lest I number you among my enemies, Bright Water Person.>

<I am not of Bright Water,> Dirt Grubber protested, but the other was gone, his mind closed against hearing. Nor could Dirt Grubber tell in what direction the other had fled. People could easily trade information—entire life histories could be shared in moments. However, such as sharing took willingness on both sides. This angry stranger desired a privacy so complete that it made a mockery of sharing.

Dirt Grubber heard Windswept’s feet pounding on the ashy ground. Bleached Fur followed her a few paces behind. In a moment, they would see the dead Person. Would they realize the cause of that one’s death? Would they realize that, in defiance of custom, tradition, and common sense, one Person had killed another?

If they did not, could he keep them from realizing? Could he somehow hide this horrible crime from the knowledge of the two-legs?

* * *

Anders raced to where Jessica crouched next to the cream and gray figure that lay so unnaturally still upon the ground.

“I wonder how long he’s been dead?” He asked. “Not long, I think. I mean there aren’t any—well, there aren’t any bugs crawling on him.”

Jessica started to touch the still form, then drew her hand back. “No. We’d better handle it as little as possible. We don’t know what killed it, but if it was disease, we might spread whatever it was to Valiant.”

Certainly the treecat had retreated a good distance from the body and seemed eager to stay away from it.

“Good point.” Anders, however, was his father’s son, and he couldn’t resist trying to figure out a little more. Picking up a stick, he gently lifted the corpse’s head. “I’m not sure this guy died from disease, Jess. Look. There and there. Those look like bite or claw marks to me. I hate to say it, but it seems to me that something ripped this poor guy’s throat out.”

“There’s not a lot of blood,” Jessica protested. “Sure, there’s some on his fur, but not much anywhere else. Maybe he caught a disease that caused itching or hives or something and those marks are from him trying to get at it. My little sister Melanie-Anne had to wear gloves all the time when she had reesels while we were living on Tasmania or she might’ve left scars. Or maybe something shot him with a poison spine. The problem with Sphinx is that we know too little about what lives here. Most of what’s been recorded is because those creatures interact in some way—usually a negative one—with humans. There are zillions of small animals, plants, birds, and insects we don’t know anything about.”

“You’ve got a point,” Anders agreed, lowering the corpse’s head and gently manipulating the torso with his stick. “It’s hard to tell with all that fur, but the poor guy does look skinny. Maybe you’re right. Maybe he’d been sick for a while and couldn’t eat. Maybe he left his clan or was chased out to avoid contagion. I guess the question is what we do with him?”

“We could bury him,” Jessica said. “That way if he was sick, the sickness won’t spread.”

“We could take him to Dr. Richard,” Anders countered. “He could probably find out the cause of death.”

“I’m not sure,” Jessica said. “Mom mentioned he’s crazy busy. The Harringtons are getting ready to go away to Manticore so they can have a holiday before Stephanie’s graduation. Anyhow, I hate the idea of the poor ’cat’s body being poked it. I mean, it’s okay for humans to do that to humans, but we don’t really know how the treecats feel about their dead. I’d hate to do something that would make Valiant uncomfortable. I can’t tell what he’s thinking, but I can feel he’s pretty miserable.”

“I wonder if Valiant knew this guy?” Anders mused. “He seems pretty upset. How far can treecats communicate?”

“No idea. And this isn’t the time to start trying to figure that out. Whether or not Valiant knew this treecat isn’t important. What we need to figure out is what we should do that won’t make him more unhappy.”

“Can you ask Valiant what we should do?”

Jessica shook her head. “Nothing that complex. The best I can do is see how he reacts if we try something like burying the body. Valiant knows how to let me know not to do something, just like he knows how to encourage me if I’m doing something he likes.”

Anders sighed. “Still, I feel funny not knowing how this treecat died. What if there’s a plague? Shouldn’t someone know?”

Jessica shook her head again, this time so violently her curls bounced and covered her face. “Not necessarily. Anders, as much as people like your dad and the other xeno-anthropologists like to forget it, the treecats were dealing with issues like death and dying for a long time before humans came to this planet. Just because this is the first dead treecat either of us have seen doesn’t mean there haven’t been others.”

“I understand.” Anders frowned. “Okay. How about this? We see how Valiant reacts if we try to bury this guy. If he doesn’t mind, we do it. But before this fellow goes in the ground, I take some images. I won’t give them to my dad or anything like that. I’ll just have them on file. We’ll mark the coordinates here, too. That way if something happens—like disease breaking out—we can at least add information.”

Jessica considered for a long while, staring at Valiant as she did so. Anders wondered if she was trying to guess her companion’s reaction. Eventually, she nodded.

“Okay. But the images don’t go to your dad. Promise?”

“Not without your permission. Not to my dad, not to anyone else on the team, not to anyone at all without your permission.”

Jessica smiled at him. “Thanks. You know, I wonder if we should ask Stephanie?”

“I don’t think so. Steph’s pretty busy with getting ready for finals. Besides, what could even Stephanie tell from a bunch of images?”

Jessica turned toward the air car. “Well, one good thing about being out collecting plants. We have shovels. I’ll get them.”

“I’ll start taking images.”

“Stop if Valiant seems unhappy.”

“Right.”

But Valiant didn’t seem to care in the least when Anders started recording images.

When Jessica returned with the shovel and started digging a hole over where the grave would neither be obvious nor interfere with her mother’s test area, Valiant loped over and started digging with her.

“I guess he agrees,” Anders said. “Unless he just thinks you’re getting ready to plant another garden bed and he’s eager to help.”

“No, it’s not that,” Jessica replied. “I think he knows why I’m doing this. I can’t explain how, since it’s just a feeling, but I think I’m right. He’s helping and he’s eager we get this taken care of. I wonder if he was so worried because he thought we were just going to leave the body to rot out in the open.”

Anders finished with his images and came over to help with the digging. They didn’t need as large a hole as they would have for a human body, but the ground had been baked hard enough that even with the modified vibro blade cutting edge on the shovel, it was hard work.

Valiant wandered off once both humans were at work and returned as they were finishing up. He’d filled one of his larger carrying nets with the reddish autumn leaves from the picketwood trees. When the humans stepped back, he dropped most of these in to line the grave.

“Well, I guess he approves,” Jessica said. “If we lift the body on one of the shovels, we can disinfect the blade afterwards. Better than using our hands. We didn’t see any bugs, but there might be some.”

“I’ll do it,” Anders said. “You stay in tune with Valiant and make sure I’m not doing anything wrong.”

But the stout treecat didn’t do anything in the way of protest. Instead, he sprinkled the last of his picketwood leaves over the corpse, then began digging the dirt back into the grave. The two humans helped him. Before long, only a small mound of broken dirt remained to mark where a fellow creature had ended his life’s journey.

“I wonder if treecats pray?” Jessica said. “My family’s lived on so many planets, I don’t really have any set religion. Still, I don’t suppose it would hurt to be quiet for a moment.”

“Not at all,” Anders agreed.

They bent their heads but kept their thoughts to themselves. Anders wondered what Valiant made of this, but he figured that the treecat was enough in touch with Jessica’s emotions to sense that respect was intended.

When Jessica raised her head her hazel-green eyes were bright with tears, but she only shook back her curls and raised her chin as if defying Anders to comment.

“Come on,” she said. “We need to record those images for my mom and take samples. I want to be back in time to help cook dinner.”

* * *

“And what do you have to say about Ms. Harrington and Mr. Zivonik now, Harvey?” Mordecai Flouret inquired genially.

Smoke drifted from the barbecue grill between him and Harvey Gleason and the shouts of children splashing in the waves rolling in from Jason Bay competed with the curious, warbling cries of the wave-cresters circling overhead. The wave-cresters were the planet Manticore’s equivalent of Old Earth’s seagulls, and the silver and brown bird analogs were just as determined when it came to scavenging any tasty bit of garbage that came their way. Which was probably why they were keeping such an avid eye on Flouret’s grill at that very moment. He rather doubted they’d have any objection to snatching one of the sauce-coated chicken breasts if the chance came.

At the moment, though, he was more interested in Gleason’s response. They might be colleagues on the Landing University faculty, and their wives and children might like one another (which was the reason for this afternoon’s picnic), but there were times he wasn’t very fond of Gleason.

The other man was very good in his field, and LUM was fortunate to have him, especially this early in the process of developing its curriculum, but he was also full of a sense of his own importance, and he sometimes seemed to resent the fact that Flouret was the chairman of a fully established department. He’d tried to downplay his irritation at being required to make room for “runny nosed kids” (as he had rather injudiciously expressed himself on one occasion) into his forestry studies courses, but he hadn’t fooled anyone who knew him. And he had a well-developed capacity to cherish grudges for a long, long time, as well, but this time he surprised Flouret.

“Actually,” he said, “I’ve been very impressed with them. Both of them, to be honest, although given how young she is, I suppose its inevitable people are going to be even more impressed with her.”

He met Flouret’s gaze levelly as he made the admission, and the criminology professor found himself forced to reconsider a few prejudices of his own. Maybe Gleason had something rather closer to an open mind than he’d thought.

“Really?” he asked.

“She’s mastered every bit of the course material without breaking a sweat,” Gleason said. “And to be honest, she already knows more about Sphinx’s flora than ninety percent of my students know after they graduate. More holes on the Manticoran side of her knowledge, but that was only to be expected, and she’s worked hard to fill them. Despite—” he acknowledged dryly “—a certain suspicion on her part that she’s never going to need that particular body of knowledge and that a certain professor’s only insisting she learn it to be a pain. And Zivonik’s just as sharp as she is, in his own way. Not as quick, perhaps, but…steadier, I think. The two of them are a team, of course. You only have to glance at them to see that. But I think his job is to be the balance wheel while hers is to go rushing off to find the next challenge. They’re surprisingly formidable for such youngsters, when you come down to it.”

“That was my impression, too,” Flouret agreed. “I have to admit I’m a little surprised to hear you share it, though, Harvey.”

“I know.” Gleason’s eyes glinted with an unusual flicker of amusement. “Didn’t expect me to admit I did, either, did you?”

“Well, no,” Flouret admitted, using his tongs to turn the chicken breasts sizzling on the grill.

“Thought not.” Gleason took a sip from his bottle of beer, then shook his head. “I suppose I had it coming, too. But do me a favor and don’t rub it in too hard, all right?”

“I’ll try, Flouret promised with a grin. “It’ll be hard, you understand, but I will try.”

Chapter Thirteen

Keen Eyes did not try to speak to any member of his clan before he reached their current nesting place. Instead, he sat while the darkness passed, striving to gain mastery over his thoughts and emotions so that he would not give himself away when he was once again close to People. There was a remote chance Beautiful Mind had not felt her mate’s death. If so, he was not going to be the one to let her know that Red Cliff had gone further than merely out of range of their mind-voices. If she did know and somehow still kept her grasp on life, he did not wish her to know that Red Cliff’s death had been horribly unnatural, that his life had been ripped from him by the claws of another Person, that even his dead body had been rejected as anathema.

He managed this nearly impossible task before he reached the grove near the river where the Landless Clan now squatted. He was relieved to learn Beautiful Mind was still alive. The females who were attending her reported that she had been very agitated at one point, so Keen Eyes suspected she already knew of her loss.

Sour Belly and some of the other elders had been lucky in their fishing that day. When Keen Eyes arrived, most of the clan were shredding their way into the tender flesh. It was an indication of their reduced circumstances that fishheads, tails, and even bones were being set aside for a later meal. Nothing even remotely edible would be wasted in these hard times.

Although Keen Eyes had returned with nothing to add to the feast, Wonder Touch, Sour Belly’s mate—a Person as sweet and nice as her mate was sour and unyielding—called out to him.

<Welcome back, Keen Eyes. We have saved you enough dinner to put some fat back on your bones. Tiny Choir and her littermates found a lake-builder’s cache from last season, so we have some fruit as well.>

Keen Eyes thanked her enthusiastically, then invited Tiny Choir and her siblings to tell him all about how they had found the dry fruit. They had really been quite clever, guessing that the pool near which the clan now camped had probably been the result of some lake-builders’ beginning work.

<Probably a death fang got them,> Tiny Choir said, her mind-voice wildly excited. <Lake-builders usually store food, so we went looking and we found it.>

Even as he praised the kittens, Keen Eyes could not but think how far the clan had fallen. To be glad to have these shriveled and bitter fruit when before their home had been destroyed these would have been tossed away as inedible. However, he was grateful. The nights were already too cold for lace-leaf to thrive. The green-needle nuts had turned to ash along with the trees that bore them. Any supplement to the thin hunting was welcome.

When he had eaten, Keen Eyes considered who he could tell about Red Cliff’s death. As much as he would have liked to keep the matter secret, there was too much risk to the clan. Already, he suspected they were in lands Trees Enfolding Clan viewed as their own. Any roving hunter might meet the same fate as Red Cliff.

Keen Eyes would have preferred to take the matter up first with the clan’s memory singers, to learn what precedents were in place for such a situation, but Wide Ears and her juniors were gone. For a moment, he considered consulting Tiny Choir, but he knew this impulse for the cowardice was. Even if Wide Ears had begun teaching the kitten, she would not have shared information about past wars between clans. Memory songs were vivid, perfectly re-creating all of the thoughts and emotions—bad, as well as good; ugly and vile as well as courageous and selfless—that the events at their heart had evoked. Songs recounting the anger and hatred, the wrenching loss of mates and kittens, the extinguishing a beloved mind-glows, were hard enough for adults to accept. They would almost certainly warp the sensibility of a growing kitten who believed that all possible problems could be resolved because shared mind-glows made misunderstandings impossible, and so they were passed only into the keeping of those made strong enough by age and experience to bear them.@

In the end, he did what he had known he must all along and reported what he had learned to all the adult members of the clan. The reaction was as bad as he had dreaded it would be.

Only respect for the young and injured kept mind-voices within their lower registers. Red Cliff’s death would have been upsetting enough, but the contempt for the entire clan shown by how his body had been dumped was enough to enrage even the most moderately tempered Person.

<I notice something very interesting in your report,> commented Bowl Shaper, a senior female highly respected for her work in clay. <Twice you have spoken with this Swimmer’s Scourge. Once his nephew Nimble Fingers was also present. However, they have taken great care to stay outside of the range at which you might have tasted their mind-glows.>

<You are correct,> Keen Eyes agreed. <I think it was deliberate. My ability to taste another’s mind-glow is not as strong as it would be if I were bonded with a mate. I guess that one or both of these is stronger than I am and would be able to detect me before I detected him. It would then be a simple matter for him to speak to me. He would know that once I heard his voice, even if I could not see him, I could reply and the advantage would remain his.>

<This speaks of a cunning individual,> Bowl Shaper replied.

<Or sneaky,> cut in Sour Belly.

<Or both,> a younger female, Knot Binder, said pacifically. <Trees Enfolding Clan has chosen its border guards carefully. We should respect this and take it into consideration when we plan what to do next.>

<And we will do something,> Sour Belly asserted. <Red Cliff may have come from elsewhere, but he had become a valued member of this clan. His children will not grow up to learn that we did not care that their father was murdered.>

<I have wondered,> Keen Eyes said, trying to share a half-formed idea that had come to him as he made his way back to the clan with news of Red Cliff’s death, <if perhaps the Trees Enfolding Clan does not understand how dire our need is. Perhaps the one who spoke to me—Swimmer’s Scourge—was so worried about the fate of his own clan this coming winter that he could not find sympathy for strangers. The fact that he was able to stay at the very fringes of my mind-glow would have made it easier for him to think only about the needs of his own clan, to see me only as an invader, a threat.>

<So?> scoffed Sour Belly. <Would you have us go to them, force our mind-glows upon them?>

<Not quite,> Keen Eyes replied, striving to project patience rather than the irritation he felt. <What if we brought one of them close enough so that he could not ignore what our mind-glows would show him? Let them taste the fear of the kittens who have lost parents, the hunger that gnaws the bellies of all our people. Once even one Person of their clan knows how terrible things are for us, surely they would at least let us pass through their territories and seek refuge elsewhere. They might even pity us and take us in.>

Keen Eyes was pleased to feel that many members of the clan were interested in his idea. Others still projected doubt. He turned to Knot Binder.

<Something about my idea troubles you? Perhaps if you would explain, we could use your ideas to make a stronger plan.>

<I am afraid of what might happen if we brought someone here. You have said that you think Trees Enfolding is tolerating our living on this poor fringe of their territory. What happens if we force the clan as a whole to take notice? What if they decide to drive us out?>

Keen Eyes was about to reply when Bowl Shaper surprised him by speaking with great force.

<I share your fear, clan sister, but either Trees Enfolding will chase us out or the coming of winter will do so. This is a decent nesting place now, but what will happen when the stream freezes and even our best fishers can no longer find prey? We have already been forced to eat the leavings of lake-builders. We have scraped the stones bare of rockfur. I am no memory singer, but I recall the tales Wide Ears told of when winter stretched unreasonably long. Then hunger-maddened clans fought each other to the death over a handful of green-needle nuts. Our Landless Clan cannot avoid conflict. We can only choose whether we will make our move while we still have some strength or wait until desperation pushes us.>

<I understand, Bowl Shaper.> Knot Binder shivered as if she felt the icy winds that Bowl Shaper had evoked in memory. <I withdraw my objection.>

<How then,> asked Sour Belly, <shall we go about issuing an invitation to visit us? Somehow, I fancy that if anyone in the Trees Enfolding Clan actually cared to know us, they would have come by now.>

Keen Eyes stroked his whiskers with one true-hand. He had thought this part out with care but had deliberately withheld the details of his plan until he knew the clan would at least consider it.

<I have an idea,> he said. <Let me show you.>

* * *

“So what did your mom have to say?”

“Um?”

Stephanie looked up from her reader. She sat crosslegged on the bench under the shading branches of the Manticoran blue-tip tree, the reader in her lap. Lionheart stretched companionably beside her with his chin propped on her thigh, and she blinked.

“I asked what your mom had to say,” Karl repeated with a smile. Stephanie in “I’m studying hard” mode had about as much situational awareness as a rock, he reflected.

“Oh.” Stephanie blinked again, then grinned crookedly, recognizing his amusement. “Sorry. I was really locked in. She said she and Dad are having a wonderful time seeing all the sights. And they darn well should, too! This is the first vacation they’ve had since we got to Sphinx.”

“I know.” Karl nodded. “They’ve worked their butts off ever since you guys got here. I’m glad they’re having a good time. Wish you could be showing them around?”

“Show them what?” Stephanie snorted a laugh. “Aside from the meetings with the Adair Foundation, we haven’t been off campus more than twice! They’re making out better with the standard guide package and their uni-links than anything I could tell them.”

“You’re probably right,” Karl agreed, and looked back down at his own reader. Despite Stephanie’s laugh, there’d been at least a little bite in her response, and from the corner of his eye he watched Lionheart’s ears twitch. He’d learned to read the ’cat’s body language almost as well as he could read another human’s, and he could tell a lot about Stephanie’s mood by reading Lionheart’s. And just that moment, she obviously wished she could be touring Manticore with her parents. Unfortunately, it was exam week, and even Stephanie was finding herself pushed by the pressure. Both of them carried averages which would see them successfully complete their courses even if they blew the finals pretty badly, but neither of them were interested in just scraping by. Doing the best they could would have been a point of pride with them under any circumstances, but given Ranger Shelton’s decision to expend precious slots on a couple of kids, they had a special responsibility to do him proud.

Not that there’d ever been much chance Stephanie wouldn’t do just that, he reflected wryly.

“You want to go back over Dr. Flouret’s discussion questions again?” Stephanie asked, as if she’d been able to read his mind, and he chuckled.

“Couldn’t hurt,” he acknowledged. “But, truth to tell, I’m more concerned about Dr. Tibbetts.” He shook his head. “I know it’s going to be open-link to the library, but I’m not as good at searching precedents as you are, Steph!”

“You’re better than you think you are,” she scolded, and Lionheart bleeked emphatically, arching his spine and stretching luxuriantly.

Karl was always putting himself down where the purely academic side of their courses were concerned, she thought. He did do better when it came to fieldwork, true, but he was better than three quarters of more of their classmates when it came to the more sedentary portions of the curriculum, as well.

“Doing better than I think I am wouldn’t be all that hard,” he pointed out with a chuckle. “Don’t bite my head off, Steph! I don’t think I’m going to tank the exam, you know. But the truth is, you’re a lot more comfortable with Jurisprudence than I am. And I’m not all that clear on why a ranger needs Jurisprudence 101, anyway. We’re not going to be judges or magistrates!”

“No,” she agreed. “But it does make sense for us to have at least a basic understanding of how it works. Right now, ranger field assignments are basically common sense and seat-of-the-pants, but it’s not going to be that way forever. That’s why Ranger Shelton’s trying to build up the supply of trained, professional rangers, and having at least some notion of what the courts are likely to do with anybody we end up dealing with in a…professional capacity, let’s say, isn’t going to hurt a thing.”

“Probably not,” he agreed. “But the truth is I’d rather take Dr. Gleason’s exam twice than take Dr. Tibbetts’ once! She always makes me think she’s going to throw me into jail somewhere if I screw up.”

“That’s a terrible thing to say!” Stephanie’s tone was severe, but her lips twitched. Dr. Emily Tibbetts—also known as Justice Tibbetts—was a senior member of the King’s Bench who taught introductory jurisprudence courses at LUM. She had a severe way about her, but Stephanie had caught something suspiciously like a twinkle in her brown eyes on more than one occasion. Besides, she’d not only decided Lionheart could accompany Stephanie to class, she obviously liked the treecat. More to the point, perhaps, Lionheart liked her. “Dr. Tibbetts is perfectly nice,” she continued. “And even if she weren’t, I promise I’d file a writ of habeas corpus as soon as her minions dragged you away.

“Gee, thanks.”

“You’re welcome. But, you know,” Stephanie went on more thoughtfully, “we could always pick Jeff’s brain. He took the same course last semester, and he’s taking Jurisprudence 102 this semester. If anyone we know knows the kinds of questions Dr. Tibbetts is likely to ask, it’s him.”

Karl raised an eyebrow at the suggestion. Jeff Harrison was one of their classmates in Dr. Flouret’s criminology course. A native of Manticore, not Sphinx, he obviously intended to pursue a law-enforcement career on the capital planet, and he was several years older than Karl, much less Stephanie. He was also ridiculously citified in Karl’s opinion, but he was fascinated by Lionheart and he’d become one of their Manticore-born friends.

Besides, Karl reminded himself, he might be hopeless in the bush, but you’re not that much better in a city, now are you?

“That might be a very good idea,” he said after a moment. “No way she’d use the same questions over again, but I really would feel better if I could talk it over with someone who’s already survived her course once!”

* * *

With Knot Binder providing direction, the Landless Clan set about building a net in which they could catch and hold another Person. This was not an easy task, for a Person’s claws were very sharp and could slash through just about anything, if given time. Nor was it a fast one. However, because they were small compared to enemies such as death fangs and snow hunters, People were also very patient, and Knot Binder’s assistants knew careful preparation could mean the difference between living and dying.

Knot Binder supplied an exceptionally tough cord that combined the fibers of several different plants with the shed fur of People. This type of cord required so much time to make that, even with fire raging closer and closer, Knot Binder had insisted on bearing a coil of it away with her. Now she showed the others how to work it into a net with a noose closure, so that it could be pulled into a sort of bag.

As a final refinement, Wonder Touch—who was one of the clan’s healers and wise about plants and their properties—supplied a bitter-tasting paste with which the strands of the net could be coated.

<It burns a little,> she cautioned, apply it with a brush. However, it should keep our captive from either biting through the net or tearing it apart as quickly.>

Keen Eyes thanked her. do not wish to keep him imprisoned very long, but anything that will gain us a little time is very welcome.>

The next stage of Keen Eyes’ plan was more complicated. After conferring with the Landless Clan’s scouts and hunters, he had confirmed his own impressions. He was the scout who had gone most deeply into the territory held by Trees Enfolding Clan and the only member of the clan who had actually encountered a member of Trees Enfolding.

Well, other than poor Red Cliff, and he cannot help us now.

This likely meant the Trees Enfolding Clan was actively avoiding the area. It was not as if there was much incentive to go into the sun-rising parts of their range, given the poor pickings. In any case, with winter coming on, every spare adult would be involved in preparing whatever food the hunters and plant gatherers brought in.

<I have encountered only Swimmer’s Scourge and Nimble Fingers,> Keen Eyes explained. <My guess is that Swimmer’s Scourge is in charge of watching our edge of their territory and that he has taken a few family members as assistants. We all know that it is easier to speak to a Person once he is known to you. Since I am at least somewhat known to these two, they will hear me before anyone else will. I will go into the general area where I found Red Cliff’s body and set the net. Then I will think angry thoughts. My hope is that one or both will come to confront me.>