He ambled back to the bench and looked at Kateos. She sat, unnaturally quiet and demur. Dowornobb had grown accustomed to her loquaciousness and her spontaneity—characteristics she revealed, with interesting exceptions, only to him. The import of their conversation was affecting him in similar ways. He sat, picked up her gloved hand, and gave a gentle squeeze. She pressed his in return, averting her eyes.

"Our lives have become complicated," he said.

"Yet at the same time more purposeful," she replied softly. "Our lives are more defined." She looked upward and outward, staring resolutely through the falling snowflakes.

"I wish to express my feelings, Mistress Kateos," he said softly.

"You have done so already, and without words, Master Dowornobb." She turned to look deeply into his eyes. Had Dowornobb retained any thoughts of independence or equivocation in the matter—which he did not—that sweet, simple, yet intense glance would have crushed all ambivalence. Dowornobb felt his gay heart and free soul climb through his eyes; he desperately wanted to belong to this female, and in wanting to belong, he needed also to possess.

"It is said that life is long, no matter how few the days, when life is shared," he said after many entranced moments.

"And it is said," Kateos added, continuing the litany, "that true love is a perpetually blooming flower that knows not seasons and can never die."

Dowornobb' s passions swelled, doubts vanished. His love scent lifted. "Mistress Kateos, our lives are uncertain. I am but a common kone, and I cannot promise comfort and wealth—"

"If certainty and wealth were that important to you, then I would rather not continue this conversation," she interrupted, most rudely.

"Please, Mistress Kateos," said the exasperated male, struggling to maintain his composure and train of thought. "Your welfare and happiness will be my responsibility. You must permit me to express my concerns, even if I am incapable of eloquence."

"Yes, Master Dowornobb," Kateos replied. "Want not eloquence if you speak sincerely."

He stared into her large, lustrous brown eyes and found himself a dazed wanderer, lost in love, not caring where he went, but ever so thankful for the chance to take the voyage. Time floated by. The air thickened with his essence.

"Master Dowornobb?" she whispered, bringing him back to the moment.

"Yes?" he said blankly. "Oh, yes!" His objective clearly in front of him, he shored up his resolve yet again and stated his position, "I want you as my mate, forever and without end."

There! It was said—a bit tersely. But she made it so difficult for him to think and talk. She looked down at the ground. No response was forthcoming. Just as he was about to expound further, she spoke.

"I have no choice in the matter. You have selected me, so I am bound to submit and to obey. It is the rule—my life is yours. Of course, I am honored." Her head bent low in submission; a large, pellucid tear welled up and clung to her lower lid. She blinked, and it fell to the ground.

"Thank you, Mistress Kateos, for your formal acceptance," Dowornobb said quietly. Suddenly it was easy for him to speak. Her abject posture injected him with the urgent need to relate his feelings. Dowornobb was a scientist and a freethinker. He loathed the orthodoxy of his society, especially if it would interfere with his ability to express his emotions, or to understand the emotions of another.

"We share a bond, an understanding, a feeling—" he stated quietly but with escalating passion, " — something deeper and more profound than ancient rules." It was his turn to lecture. "I want to be your companion. I want you to be my companion—for life—forever and always. I want you as my mate, not because I have ordered it so, and not because I am willing to take social responsibility for your children. I want you to be my mate because, and only because, you wish to be. If that is not the case, you may walk from me and not turn back. I will not invoke the social rules, and I would be disappointed in you if those were your reasons for submitting to my wish."

She gazed into his face as he lectured, and her demeanor fairly glowed with each word of admonishment. Dowornobb detected her love scent exploding in waves.

"Oh, I promise you!" she declared effusively, taking Dowornobb aback. "I promise you that my acceptance demonstrates my expression of free will. I am yours forever. I am yours because I want to be. You are my master."

"I am your mate," he said emphatically, their scents blending. She squeezed his hand, tears flowing freely down her beautiful face. "My mate, this promise is an undying flame. It will always be kindled and it cannot be extinguished," she said with a liquid fervor that made Dowornobb's emotional bubble nearly burst with boundless ecstasy.

Stemming his exhilaration, Dowornobb stared into her eyes and declared his love. "The promise is the marriage. The marriage is the promise. We are mated. I will file the necessary papers."

"We must keep them isolated," whistled Koop-the-facilitator. "They are boisterous and rude! They are unclean and they smell. We fear they may be evil!" The assembled body of elders and guild representatives listened to the harangues cataloging the questionable behavior of their guests. The cliff dwellers could not countenance the long-legs' voracious appetites, their rambunctiousness, their rudeness.

"With immense respect, my elder," Toon chirped from the visitors' gallery, standing without sanction and unrecognized. "May I speak?"

The facilitator looked down from the assembly podium, irritated with the impudent interruption. The assembly was occupied primarily by members of the dweller congress, the duly elected guild and hunter officials.

"Ah, supervisor Toon!" the facilitator acknowledged. "Thy reports art the basis of our findings. What is it thou wouldst say?"

"I humbly address the council," replied the steam user. "My reports have not served thee well, for while thy decision to continue the quarantine may be correct, thy logic for doing so is faulty."

The assemblage murmured at the steam user's blatant affront.

"The crude behavior of the long-legs should not be seen as evil or base," Toon continued hurriedly, desperately holding on to his courage. "The long-legs are different. We should reserve judgment until we have a better understanding. Arrogant and ill mannered yes, but they are not evil. They desire to be good, but they act as individuals, selfishly and without common purpose."

Murmurs grew louder. Toon raised his voice and continued.

"I humbly propose the long-legs be provided with labor, even if it means exposing them to our society. Gainful employment will exhaust their energies in worthwhile endeavor, and it will serve to give them value in our eyes."

The great hall was silent. The council of elders stared down at the lone engineer as if he were an insect. The silence lingered.

"Toon' s words have merit," interjected Braan, leader-of-thehunters. He stood erect, not apologizing for the parliamentary breach.

Koop glared down. Such disruptions reflected ill on his leadership.

"The hunter leader is recognized," warbled the facilitator with poorly concealed resignation.

"Permission to speak is humbly accepted," Braan whistled as he took the speaker's dock, talons clicking obnoxiously. "Hunters have billeted the long-legs for four cycles of the small moon and have observed them firsthand—not from rumor or from steam user Toon' s reports. The long-legs have good qualities—many good qualities. If they are evil, then we are equally so."

Remonstrative jeers whistled around the assembly. Braan turned and belligerently scanned the members, defiantly awaiting the disruption to attenuate. The floor was his.