They frowned suspiciously, these humans, but they stopped frowning when they learned precisely where home was — some distance beyond knnn space and kif.

“Got between,” Tully said enthusiastically, jabbing the chart which showed hani and mahendo’sat territory, cupping one hand on the hani-mahendo’sat side and one hand on the human side, with the kif neatly between. The hands moved together slowly, clenched. “So.”

So, so, so, Pyanfar thought, and her lips drew back and her nose wrinkled cheerfully.

In time, he went, back to his own… that last sealing of the lock which marked the separation of the human ship from Gaohn. Ulysses, its name was, which Tully had said meant Far-Voyages. Nearly fifty humans lived on it, and whether they were related or not, she could not determine.

They prepared to go. She started back across the docks to The Pride, to follow — with a smallish cargo, nothing of great mass, but items of interest to humans. There might be a chance to see Tully at voyage’s end, but it would hardly be the same. He belonged with his own, that was what, and she did not begrudge him that.

She planned to have use of that acquaintance, Tully — and the captain of this Far-Voyages. So, of course, did Goldtooth, with his sleek refitted ship, going with them, while Jik carried messages back to the Personage, no doubt, and the mahendo’sat tried to figure out how to cheat an honest hani out of exclusive arrangements.

But the odds in that encounter were even.