"I just remembered these crystals," Jedra said, extending his hand. "They've got some odd kind of presence to them, but I can't figure out what. I thought maybe you could."

Kitarak glanced at them. "Ah, those. I told you before, they're probably just magical talismans. Either that or they're empowered gems used for storing psionic energy." He clicked his mouth in laughter. "Given what you and Kayan are capable of together, you certainly don't need anything like that." He turned back to the device on his workbench. "Look here!" he said proudly. "I have nearly repaired this clock. I need only make one more gear, and I believe it will run."

Kitarak obviously wasn't interested in Jedra's crystals. Jedra looked at the tohr-kreen's tiny nest of overlapping wheels with the same lack of enthusiasm. He couldn't imagine how it could do anything, much less run anywhere, but he would take Kitarak's word for it.

Power-storage crystals, eh? He tried tapping into one, imagining its energy flowing into him, but nothing happened. Maybe it was more like a mindlink. He tried that, and this time he got a glimmer of contact. It felt as though there might actually be something to link with, as if there were more than simple energy inside. He tried a little harder, pushing for linkage...

Hey! Kayan's angry shout startled him out of contact. What do you think you're doing? she demanded.

Trying to mindlink with one of these crystals, he said.

Sure you are, she said, acrimony oozing from her voice. You're trying to force yourself on me. Well, where I come from, that's called mindrape. And the next time you try it, I'll squish your filthy intrusive brain out through your ears, you got it?

Kayan, that's not what I-

Stay out of my head!

Sudden pain flared in Jedra's skull. He clutched his head and rocked backward in agony, then Kitarak's training took hold and he shielded his mind from her attack.

A thump and a crash sounded from the workshop, then Kitarak stomped into the great room. "What is going on here?" he bellowed, his voice amplified psionically until it rattled the stones in the roof.

Jedra leaned out through the doorway. "I, uh, I was trying to link with those crystals, but I evidently slipped and pushed myself on Kayan instead." She stuck her head out from the library, and he told her, "Really, | Kayan, that's what happened."

"Sure."

Kitarak looked at Jedra, then at her. "You made me ruin the gear I was making," he told her.

She hung her head. "I'm sorry."

"You should be." Kitarak rasped his arms against his sides loud enough to make Jedra and Kayan wince. "You two have the worst control of anybody I've ever had the misfortune to tutor. Jedra, your attempt to mindlink- whether aimed at Kayan or not-was the clumsiest I've felt since I stepped on a baby tembo. No wonder she blasted you. I was just about to do it myself. But you"- he looked back at Kayan-"your unfocused tantrum was even worse. It had all the subtlety of a detonation spell. I am ashamed to call you students if this is the way you use my teaching."

"I'm sorry," Kayan said again.

"Me, too," said Jedra, nearly writhing with embarrassment. "I didn't mean to bother anybody."

"Well, you did," said Kitarak. "And so did you," he said to Kayan. He rasped his arms again, then stepped farther into the room. "Sit down," he said, gesturing at the cushions. "Join your minds. I will teach you control or die in the attempt."

Kayan lingered in the doorway. "I don't think I-"

"Sit down!" Kitarak's voice jerked her into action, and she practically leaped for the cushions. Jedra didn't wait to be told a second time.

"Converge," Kitarak told them.

Jedra looked at Kayan. Her eyes smoldered with pure hatred. All the same, Jedra felt the familiar tingling in his mind that signaled her presence, so he closed his eyes on her physical form and let his mind touch hers.

They linked, but their agitation kept them from merging completely. I'm really sorry, Jedra said as soon as he realized he hadn't lost his identity in the union this time.

I bet, she replied.

Kitarak's mind joined them, a cold, dark, alien presence even less comforting than their own uneasy intellects. Calm yourselves, he said. We will start with a simple probe. Both of you, see if you can find what I'm visualizing. Kitarak's presence winked out as completely as if he had never existed. He had shielded himself.

Kayan? Jedra asked.

What?

I really wasn't trying to-

Drop it. Kitarak's waiting. Are you going to try to break through his shield, or are you going to just sit there whining?

Damn it, I'm trying to apologize!

I don't want your apology. I don't want anything from you, understand?

The emotions boiling through the link hurt far more than her words. Jedra felt her contempt for him like a physical wound in his guts. Worse, he felt her own pain and knew he had caused it. He had hurt her deeply with his foolish remark about slumming.

He shouldn't have forced her, not so soon after his earlier disaster trying to establish contact with the crystals. Get away from me! she snarled, and she lashed out at him with her mind.

Jedra suddenly found himself in complete panic. His heart pounded as if it would tear itself free from his. chest, and he felt certain that horrible, agonizing death would come in the next instant. He tried to shield himself from it, but Kayan's attack swept through his mental barrier as if it weren't even there. She had become the avenging angel of death, come to torture him until he cried out for death as sweet release.

He tried to flee, but in convergence his body was only an abstraction, and wherever he could go mentally she could easily follow. His panic mounted, drowning out rational thought and leaving only the animal core of his being to act instinctively against the threat.

He felt energy surging back through the mindlink, a wave of raw power directed at the source of his panic. Still linked, he felt it strike Kayan and blast into her unshielded mind like a sandstorm through a tent, ripping her consciousness to tatters and scattering it to the winds. He felt her scream in terror, felt her strike back in her own last-ditch effort, and...

... and nothing. Their linked minds suddenly stopped feeling anything, stopped sending or receiving or even thinking. They existed as two separate points of view suspended in nothingness.

Then time started again, and Kitarak's voice said, That is enough. Jedra felt the mindlink break, and he found himself back in the tohr-kreen's great room, shivering with muscle spasms and soaked in sweat.

Kayan looked pale as a zombie. Jedra panicked all over again, afraid he had killed her, but she finally took a deep, shuddering breath and opened her eyes.

Kitarak didn't seem to care about their physical condition. "You disgrace me," he said as soon as they could hear him. "Both of you. You ignore your lessons, preferring to battle instead, and when you do you nearly kill one another. If I hadn't suppressed your abilities, you would have killed one another. What were you thinking?"

Jedra clenched his muscles to stop them from shivering. "I wanted to show her that I hadn't meant anything before, but when I tried she hit me with-I don't know what she did, but I suddenly felt like I had to escape, and since I couldn't do that, I struck back."

Kayan neither denied nor agreed with his explanation. She just closed her eyes and took deep breaths.

"I see," Kitarak said. "You wanted to show her that you meant no harm, so the first thing you did when she took offense was try to kill her."

"No!" said Jedra. "I didn't mean to hurt anybody; I just panicked."

"And you?" Kitarak asked Kayan. "Do you have an equally miserable excuse for your behavior?"