Dear lolanthe,

As you can see from this letter, I am alive . . . or was at the time of its writing . . . and in good health, excepting the effects of several days spent bound and gagged.

Well, it looks like I tumbled for the oldest trick in the book. The Lonely Traveler routine. I am in good company. Countless diplomats more talented than I have fallen victim to their own frail, human needs. . . .

My keepers command me not to ramble, so I'll try to be concise. I am supposed to tell you not to report that I am missing until two days after receiving this. Continue pretending that I took ill after my speech: Some will imagine foul play, while others will say I'm bluffing the Council. No matter. If you do not buy my captors the time they need, they threaten to bury me where I cannot be found.

They also say they have agents in the police bureaus. They will know if they are betrayed.

I am now supposed to plead with you to cooperate, so my life will be spared. The first draft of this letter was destroyed because I waxed a bit sarcastic at this point, so let me just say that, old as I am, I would not object to going on a while longer, or seeing more of the universe.

I do not know where they are taking me, now that summer is over and travel is unrestricted in any direction. Anyway, if I wrote down clues from what I see and hear around me, they would simply make me rewrite yet again. My head hurts too much for that, so we'll leave it there.

I will not claim to have no regrets. Only fools say that. Still, I am content. I've been and done and seen and served. One of the riches of my existence has been this opportunity to dwell for a time on Stratos.

My captors say they'll be in touch, soon. Meanwhile, with salutations, I remain — Renna.

22

In near-total darkness she stroked Brod's forehead, tenderly brushing his sodden hair away from coagulating gashes. The youth moaned, tossing his head, which Maia held gently with her knees. Despite a plenitude of hurts, she felt thankful for small blessings, such as this narrow patch of sand they lay upon, just above an inky expanse of chilly, turbid water. Thankful, also, that this time she wasn't fated to awaken in some dismal place, after a whack on the head. My skull's gotten so hard, anything that'd knock, me out would kill me. And that won't happen till the world's done amusing itself, pushing me around.

"Mm … Mwham-m . . . ?" Brod mumbled. Maia sensed his vocalization more via her hands than with her shock-numbed hearing. Still unconscious, Brod seemed nevertheless wracked with duty pangs, as if at some level he remained anxious over urgent tasks left undone. "Sh, it's all right," she told him, though barely able to make out her own words. "Rest, Brod. I'll take care of things for a while."

Whether or not he actually heard her, the boy seemed to calm a bit. Her fingers still traced somnolent worry knots across his brow, but he did stop thrashing. Brdd's sighs dropped below audible to her deafened ears.

In its last moments, their dying boat had spilled them inside this cave, while more explosions just behind them brought down the entrance in a rain of shattered rock. Amid a stygian riot of seawater and sand, her head ringing with a din of cannonade, Maia had groped frantically for Brod, seizing his hair and hauling him toward a frothy, ill-defined surface. Up and down were all topsy-turvy during those violent moments when sea and shore and atmosphere were one, but practice had taught Maia the knack of seeking air. Rationing her straining lungs, she had fought currents like clawing devils till at last, with poor Brod in tow, her feet found muddy purchase on a rising slope. Maia managed to crawl out, dragging her friend above the waterline and falling nearby to check his breathing in utter blackness. Fortunately, Brod coughed out what water he'd inhaled. There were no apparent broken bones. He'd live . . . until whatever came next.

All told, their wounds were modest. If the skiff had stayed intact, we'd have ridden that wave straight into some underground wall, she envisioned with a shudder. Only the boat's premature fragmentation had saved their lives. The dunking had cushioned their final shorefall.

Maia felt cushioned half to death. Even superficial cuts hurt like hell. Sandy grit lay buried in every laceration, with each grain apparently assigned its own cluster of nerves. To make matters worse, evaporation sucked the heat out of her body, setting her teeth chattering.

But we're not dead, another voice within her pointed out defiantly. And we won't be, if I can find a way out of here before the sea rises.

Not an easy proposition, she admitted, shivering. This undercut cave probably fills and empties twice a day, routinely washing itself clean of jetsam like us.

Maia guessed they had at least a few hours. More life-span than she had expected during those final moments, plunging toward a horrible, black cavity in the side of a towering dragon's tooth. I should be grateful for even a brief reprieve, she thought, shaking her head. Forgive me, though, if I fail to quite see the point.

In retrospect, it seemed pathetically dumb to have gone charging off to rescue Renna — and to redeem her sister — only to fail so totally and miserably. Maia felt especially sorry for Brod, her companion and friend, whose sole fatal error had been in following her.

I should never have asked him. He's a man, after all. When he dies, his story ends.

The same could be said for her, of course. Both men and vars lacked the end-of-life solace afforded to normal folk — to clones — who knew they would continue through their clanmates, in all ways but direct memory.

I guess there's still a chance for me in that way. Leie could succeed in her plans, become great, found a clan. She sniffed sardonically. Maybe Leie'll put a statue of me in the courtyard of her hold. First in a long row of stern effigies, all cast from the same mold.

There were other, more modest possibilities, closer to Maia's heart. Although the twins' minor differences had irked them, important things, like their taste in people, had always matched. So, there was a chance Leie might be drawn to Renna, as Maia had. Perhaps Leie would forsake her reaver pals and help the man from outer space, even grow close to him.

That should make me feel better, Maia pondered. I wonder why it doesn't?

In successive ebbs and flows, the waterline had been gradually climbing higher along the sandy bank where they lay. Soon the icy liquid sloshed her legs, as well as Brod's lower torso. Here comes the tide, Maia thought, knowing it was time to force her reluctant, battered body to move again. Groaning, she hauled herself upright. Taking the boy by his armpits, Maia gritted her teeth and strained to drag him upslope three, four meters . . . until her backside abruptly smacked into something hard and jagged.

"Ouch! Damn the smuggy . . ."

Maia laid Brod down on the sand and reached around, trying to rub a place along her spine. She turned and with her other hand began delicately exploring whatever obdurate, prickly barrier loomed out of the darkness to block her retreat. Carefully at first, she lightly traced what turned out to be a nearly vertical wall of randomly pointed objects . . . slim ovoids coated with slime. Shells, she realized. Hordes of barnaclelike creatures clung tenaciously to a stone cliff face while patiently awaiting another meal, the next tidal flood of seaborne organic matter.

I guess this is as far as we go, she noted with resignation. Depression and fatigue almost made her throw herself on the sand next to Brod, there to pass her remaining minutes in peace. Instead, with a sigh, Maia commenced feeling her way along the wall, trying not to wince each time another craggy shell pinched or scraped her hands. The thick band of algae-covered carapaces continued above her farthest reach, confirming that full tide stretched much higher than she could.