From his left, Sylvie leaned forward far enough to look across Fiben to Gailet on his right. The two shared a glance and a grin.

Fiben sighed. At least he had persuaded Cordwainer Appelbe to keep that damned upgrade to white card secret! Fat lot of good it would do, of course. Green- and blue-status chimmies from all over Port Helenia were after him already. And Gailet and Syrvie were hardly any help at all. Why the hell had he married them, anyway, if not for protection! Fiben sniffed at the thought. Protection, indeed! He suspected the two of them were interviewing and evaluating candidates.

Whether or not two species came from the same clan, or even the same planet, there would always be some basics that were different between them. Look at how much pre-Contact humans had varied for simply cultural reasons. Of course matters of love and reproduction among chims had to be based on their own sexual heritage, from long before Uplift.

Still, there was enough human conditioning in Fiben to make him blush when he thought of what these two were going to put him through, now that they were close friends. How did I let myself get into such a situation?

Sylvie caught his eye and smiled sweetly. He felt Gailet’s hand slip into his.

Well, he admitted with a sigh. I guess it wasn’t all that hard.

They were reading names now, calling people up to accept their medals. But for a while Fiben felt just the three of them, sitting there together, as if the rest of the world were only an illusion. Actually, under his outward cynicism, he felt pretty good.

Robert Oneagle rose and stepped to the dais to accept his medal, looking much more comfortable in his uniform than Fiben felt. Fiben watched his human pal. I’ve got to ask him who his tailor is.

Robert had kept his beard, and the hard body won in rugged mountain living. He was no stripling any longer. In fact, he looked every inch a storybook hero.

Such nonsense. Fiben sniffed in disgust. Gotta get that boy pissed drunk real soon. Beat him arm-wrestling. Save him from believing ever thing the press writes,

Robert’s mother, on the other hand, seemed to have aged appreciably during the war. Over the last week Fiben had seen her repeatedly blink up at her tall, bronzed son, walking by with the grace of a jungle cat. She seemed proud but bewildered at the same time, as if the fairies had taken away her own child and left a changeling in its place. It’s called growing up, Megan.

Robert saluted and turned to head back toward his seat. As he passed in front of Fiben, his left hand made a quick motion, sign talk spelling out a single word. Beer!

Fiben started laughing but choked it back as both Sylvie and Gailet turned to look at him sharply. No matter. It was good to know Robert felt as he did. Talon Soldiers were almost preferable to this ceremonial nonsense.

Robert returned to his seat next to Lieutenant Lydia McCue, whose own new decoration shone on the breast of her glistening dress tunic. The woman Marine sat erect and attentive to the proceedings, but Fiben could see what was invisible to the dignitaries and the crowd, that the toe of her boot had already lifted the cuff of Robert’s trouser leg.

Poor Robert fought for composure. Peace, it seemed, offered its own travails. In its way, war was simpler.

Out in the crowd Fiben caught sight of a small cluster of humanoids, slender bipedal beings whose foxlike appearance was belied by fringes of gently waving tendrils just above their ears. Among the gathered Tymbrimi he easily picked out Uthacalthing and Athaclena. Both had declined every honor, every award. The people of Garth would have to wait until the two departed before erecting any memorials. That restraint, in a sense, would be their reward.

The ambassador’s daughter had erased many of the facial and bodily modifications which had made her look so nearly human. She chatted in a low voice with a young male Tym who Fiben supposed could be called handsome, in an Eatee sort of way.

One would think the two young people — Robert and his alien consort — had readjusted completely to returning to their own folk. In fact, Fiben suspected each was now far more at ease with the opposite sex than they had been before the war.

And yet…

He had seen them come together once, briefly, during one of the endless series of diplomatic receptions and conferences. Their heads had drawn quite near, and although no words were exchanged, Fiben was certain he saw or sensed something whirl lightly in the narrow space between them.

Whatever mates or lovers they would have in the future, it was clear that there was something Athaclena and Robert would always share, however much distance the Universe put between them.

Sylvie returned to her seat upon receiving her own commendation. Her dress could not quite hide the rounding of her figure. Another change Fiben would have to get used to pretty soon. He figured the Port Helenia Fire Department would probably have to hire more staff when that little kid started taking chemistry in school.

Gailet embraced Sylvie and then approached the podium herself. This time the cheers and applause were so sustained that Megan Oneagle had to motion for order.

But when Gailet spoke, it was not the rousing victory paean the crowd obviously expected. Her message, it seemed, was much more serious.

“Life is not fair,” she said. The murmuring audience went silent as Gailet looked out across the assembly and seemed to meet their eyes as individuals. “Anyone who says it is, or even that it ought to be, is a fool or worse. Life can be cruel. Ifni’s tricks can be capricious games of chance and probability. Or cold equations will cut you down if you make one mistake in space, or even step off the sidewalk at the wrong moment and try too quickly to match momentum with a bus.

“This is not the best of all possible worlds. For if it were, would there be illogic? Tyranny? Injustice? Even evolution, the wellspring of diversity and the heart of nature, is so very often a callous process, depending on death to bring about new life.

“No, life is not just. The Universe is not fair.

“And yet” — Gailet shook her head — “and yet, if it is not fair, at least it can be beautiful. Look around you now. There is a sermon greater than anything I can tell you. Look at this lovely, sad world that is our home. Behold Garth!”

The gathering took place upon the heights just south of the new Branch Library, in a meadow with an open view in all directions. To the west, all could see the Sea of Cilmar, its gray-blue surface colored with streaks of floating plant life and dotted with the spumelike trails of underwater creatures. Above lay the blue sky, scrubbed clean by the last storm of winter. Islands gleamed in the morning sunlight, like distant magical kingdoms.

On the north side of the meadow lay the beige tower of the Branch Library, its rayed spiral sigil embossed in sparkling stone. Freshly planted trees from two score worlds swayed gently in the breezes stroking over and around the great monolith, as timeless as its store of ancient knowledge.

To the east and south, beyond the busy waters of Aspinal Bay, lay the Valley of the Sind, already beginning to sprout with early green shoots, filling the air with the aromas of spring. And in the distance the mountains brooded, like sleeping titans ready to shrug off their brumal coats of snow.

“Our own petty lives, our species, even our clan, feel terribly important to us, but what are they next to this? This nursery of creation? This was what was worth fighting for. Protecting this” — she waved at the sea, the sky, the valley, and the mountains — “was our success.

“We Earthlings know better than most how unfair life can be. Perhaps not since the Progenitors themselves has a clan understood so well. Our beloved human patrons nearly destroyed our more beloved Earth before they learned wisdom. Chims and dolphins and gorillas are only the beginnings of what Would have been lost had they not grown up in time.”