"Sampsa. Enough now."
He stared at her, then bowed his head. "Father's coming."
For a moment she thought it was more of his nonsense, then she, too, heard the sound of the cruiser. She laughed, the business with the "other one" forgotten, her joy at Kim's return making her pick Sampsa up and whirl him about. Then, setting him down, she hurried across to the open doors at the back of the house.
As the cruiser swept across the island, its powerful searchlights flickering across the blackness of the treetops, Jelka came out into the front garden and, shielding her eyes against the glare, watched the ship touch down.
As Kim stepped down, she rushed across and embraced him, moving back with him as the cruiser lifted and, turning in the air, accelerated into the night.
"I didn't think—" she began, but his kiss stopped her saying any more. When they broke, she moved her face back a little, studying his face in the moonlight.
"Did you see Father?"
He shook his head and sighed. "I went there, but he wouldn't see me. I left the holo for him."
"Ah . . ." She tried not to show the disappointment. "Where's Sampsa?" he asked, turning and walking with her toward the house.
"I don't know. He was with me in the garden. He must have slipped away."
She looked at him again. "So how did it go?"
There was a small movement in his face. "It's bad," he said. "I didn't realize how bad. We've been isolated too long."
She frowned, surprised by his words. "But I thought you liked it here."
"Here might not survive much longer. Not unless we do something. The Enclave is in trouble. The attack today weakened it badly. How badly we'll know in a matter of days. But things are in a critical state. I felt"—he shrugged, then looked away, embarrassed—"I felt as if I'd let them all down."
She reached out, turning his face gently with her hand until he was looking at her again. "Why do you feel that way? You've given them so much. Your inventions—"
"Are toys. What have I given them that's real? Have I given the means to fight off their enemies? Have I given them the means to feed their population?"
"But those are not your problems. . . ."
"No? Then why was I given my talent? Why, if not to make things better for everyone?"
"But that's perverse. You're not responsible for them."
"No? Then to who do I owe my living, my existence? Without the City—without Li Yuan—I would have nothing. I would be dust. Without them I would not have you."
She felt the power of his love, of his conviction, wash over her, and gave a tiny nod. "If that's how you feel, then you must do something. But what can you do?"
He stared back at her and smiled, glad that she was with him. "I don't know, my love. Not yet. But I shall. Something will suggest itself."
SAMPSA MADE HIS WAY down through the darkness with the stealth of a young fox. Where the path twisted and the ground leveled out was the clearing. Coming out into it he looked up and saw the moon, bright and full in the cloudless sky, and smiled.
Seven tall pines had once stood here, forming the shape of a staggered H beneath the stars. Fire from the heavens had burned them to ashen stumps. Now, where seven had once stood, only one now sprouted—a sapling of sixteen years, growing at the very center of the clearing.
Sampsa made his way across, jumping from stump to stump until he stood beneath the sapling. It was a windless night and the young tree stood there, still and proud in the moonlight, a young giant, growing even as the great earth turned, slowly reaching for the stars.
For a moment Sampsa rested, his back to it, staring up at the house, at the lighted windows of the tower, then he slipped away, moving back into the blackness between the trees, heading down to where the land fell sheer to the sea.
There he stood, nodding to himself, understanding.
"Sampsa?"
He turned, surprised, staring at his father. "How do you do that?"
Kim laughed. "My mother taught me."
"You had a mother?"
Kim moved past his son and stood at the very edge of the cliff. His feet were bare, Sampsa noted. For a moment Kim stared out at the sea, listening, it seemed, to its faint sussuration, then he looked back at his son.
"I'll show you a hologram of her sometime. As for the art of traveling silently, it's a trick I picked up in the Clay. We all did. Sound echoes in the Clay. Things are dry and snap easily, and there are enemies everywhere. You have to learn where to put your feet—how to see with your feet in the dark. Once learned, you never forget."
Sampsa nodded thoughtfully, then squatted. He picked up a pine cone and turned it between his fingers. "What is it like in there?"
"In the Clay?"
"No. Where you've just been."
"The Enclave?" Kim sighed. "It's like a box. A huge box, filled with teeming life. You know, sometimes it makes me think of the story of Morpheus, the god of sleep. Sometimes I think he has cast a great spell over humankind these past two hundred years—that we live, somehow, in his dreams. The dreams of Morpheus."
"But not us," Sampsa said, staring up at his father, his eyes round. "Not here."
"No. . . ."
"Are there other places? . . . Outside, I mean."
Kim turned, then squatted across from him. "There's Li Yuan's pal- I ace at Astrakhan. And the Plantations, of course. And . . . well, I there's Shepherd's place. The Domain."
"The Domain?" Sampsa stared at the pine cone in his hand. "Where's that?"
"Oh, south of here. Far south, in the Western Isle. I've not been there, but I'm told it's idyllic. Not so cold as our island, nor so rugged. It's a valley. Shepherd lives there with his sister."
Sampsa looked up at him. "Just them?"
"I don't know. I assume there are guards. Like we have guards. Apart from that . . ." He shrugged. "Why?"
"Nothing." Sampsa looked away across the sea, then, standing, threw the cone out into the air.
"Shall we get back?" he said, turning, looking back at his father, his eyes—one blue, one brown—strangely troubled.
"If you like," Kim answered, getting up and brushing himself down. He reached out and touched his son's shoulder. "I have to go back. Tomorrow. I might be spending a lot more time there from now on."
Sampsa nodded.
"You don't mind, then?"
The boy looked up at him. "I don't mind. As long as you keep your promise to come diving."
Kim grinned. "Tomorrow morning. First light. We'll go down before the cruiser comes for me, neh?"
Sampsa smiled, then, ducking underneath a low branch, slipped into the darkness, heading back toward the house. Kim listened a moment, hearing the faint sounds of his son's passage through the trees, then followed, melting like a shadow into the dark, the image of his mother burning like a candle in his head.
NEVILLE LET HIMSELF into the room of the SimFic stay-over. Setting his case on a chair, he sat down heavily on the bed and began to pull off his boots. It had been a long, hard day and he felt exhausted, but his mind was still racing, filled with the excitement of the launch.
It could not have gone better—not in his wildest dreams. First-day sales figures were phenomenal, and the review . . .
He laughed. You could not have bought the kind of reviews Ben Shepherd was getting!
"Here, let me do that. . . ."
There was the soft touch of a female hand on his shoulder, the faintest waft of scent—discreet and inoffensive. He turned, looking up at the girl. She was a young Han with a pretty face: one of SimFic's hospitality girls, chosen to fit his preference profile. Relaxing, he let her tend to him while he recalled the day's events.
He had met Shepherd only once before, when the deal had been signed, and had found him strangely cold, almost hostile, but today had been a revelation—today Ben Shepherd had been mesmeric. Why, he could have charmed the gods from the heavens!