yond the greenery, she could tell that Roshaun was feeling the same impact. You are frightened, Filif said to Dairine. It s clouding your thinking. Sit down and be quiet until you ve managed the fear. Dairine sat down, hard, as if she d been pushed. Maybe I was, she thought, somewhat dazed. She wasn t quite sure if Filif hadn t given her muscles a hint. And you re frightened, too, Filif said to Roshaun. And it s making you angry because you feel powerless. Sit down and be quiet until you find your power again. Roshaun sat down as hard as Dairine had. She watched this with both confusion and satisfaction, but at the bottom of it was a kind of scared awe. She had been fooled by Filif s diffident manner, and had been treating him as a bush in a baseball cap, someone faintly funny. She d had no idea there was such power underneath. For some few moments there wasn t any sound but both Dairine and Roshaun breathing hard. Eventually this sound, too, started to slow. When it did, Filif said, So. What does one do about a problem like this There are a number of possible solutions that would cure this problem permanently, Roshaun said. Most of them need a lot of time for assessments, though, to tailor the wizardry to the star. And I don t think we have enough time for that right now. There are some faster interventions, though. Effective at least in the short term. They buy you time to enact the more complex solutions. What is the best intervention for this problem, then Roshaun took a long breath. Bleeding the star. What Dairine said. Bleeding the star. You remove a small percentage of its mass. Remove it To where Anywhere you like, but out of the star s corpus. Yes, it s dangerous! Bleed off too much mass, and fusion in the star fails. Bleed off too little, and the intervention merely makes the star s core go critical sooner. Its core Dairine broke out in a sweat. It s not going to go nova, is it No. Nothing like that. But there are worse things. Worse than the Sun going nova ! Roshaun gave her a bleak look. For a moment he didn t speak. How would you like it, he said at last, if your star flared up just enough to roast one side of your world That happened to our planet once. I would have thought you d noticed. Or maybe you didn t read the orientation package. It s right there on the first page of the historical material Dairine flushed hot. She was a fast reader, sometimes too fast. She had missed it, and now felt profoundly stupid. My great-great-ancestors were a family of wizards, back then, Roshaun said. In their time, our star flared without warning. The land on that side of Wellakh was blasted to slag and lava; the seas on that side boiled off. The air on that side all burned away. The wizards of the world had just enough time between the flare and its wave front s arrival to isolate the spaceward side of Wellakh from the worst effects of the flare, and to keep the planet s ecology from being completely destroyed in the terrible winds and floods and fires that followed. But only just enough. It was very close, and almost all of the wizards died from giving all of their power to keep the world and its people alive. Then, after that, it took centuries of suffering and rebuilding for our world to recover. The quick obliteration that a nova would have brought would have seemed merciful by comparison. Dairine swallowed. But afterward, Roshaun said, my ancestors, wizards and nonwizards both, spent generations learning how the sun behaved, finding out how to cure it. And they did cure it, finally, though again, almost all of my line s wizards died in the cure. Why do you think my family are kings now They gave their lives to save the world, to make sure it would never need to be saved again from death by fire. So that in any generation where a wizard is born into the royal family again, everyone looks at them and says, See, there s the son of the Sun Lord, the Guarantor, there s the one who ll give his life to protect us… Without particularly asking what you had in mind to do with your life besides that, Dairine thought, hearing Roshaun s voice go rough with abrupt pain. And she found herself thinking of the view from the balcony of Roshaun s family s palace, right across that very flat, strangely featureless landscape…right in the middle of the sealess, mountainless, melted-down side of the world. Who built that there to make sure that the Sun Kings never forgot what they were there for Dairine thought. As if to say, We ll give them everything they want…but when the bad day comes again, they d better deliver! She sat there in silence, feeling shock and shame in nearly equal parts. Roshaun s bleak look was turned more inward now, and he seemed not to register Dairine looking at him. Finally, he did glance over at her once more, and something of the old cool distance was back in his eyes. But now Dairine knew it was a mask, and she also knew what lay under it. I m an idiot, Dairine said. Roshaun simply looked at her. So did Spot. She looked down at him. Yes, I am, Dairine said. This is no time for misguided loyalty. We ve got to do something. She looked back over at Roshaun. But we still have to get permission, Dairine said. She looked down at Spot. Any luck finding the planetary supervisor yet No. Dairine covered her face with her hands. Great. We can t do this, we can t, without making sure that no one else is I do have an authorization, though, Spot said. Dairine looked up, surprised. What From where Spot popped his lid up and showed her. In the Speech, very small, Dairine saw the characters that spelled out the words Approved. Go. Following those was a shorthand version of a wizardly name, but even the shorthand version was very long, and the power rating appended to it was so high that Dairine looked at it several times to make sure she wasn t just misplacing a decimal point. This is a Galactic Arm coordinator s ID, Dairine said softly. It made her feel no better in terms of an answer to the question of where Earth s wizardly command structure had gone all of a sudden. But at least she knew now that she wouldn t be interfering with anyone else s intervention. All right, she said. Let s go fix the Sun. Kit woke up with Ponch s wet nose in his face. Nita says you should get up. Nita is a nuisance, Kit muttered. And Quelt is here. Kit blinked. That s another story, he said. I want to catch her before she goes out on business or something … Kit rolled off his couch, grabbed the bathrobe he d brought with him, wrapped it around himself and headed out the door at such speed that he nearly knocked Quelt flat. She was carrying a basket of laundry, and she staggered, and then laughed. Kit grabbed her and steadied her, and then rocked back himself, off balance. Are you all right Quelt said. Yeah, I m fine, Kit said, and I have one question for you. What s the Relegate s Naos Quelt looked at him in some surprise. Uh, it s where the Lone Power lives, she said. Kit stared. It lives here Of course she does, Quelt said, putting the laundry basket down and looking at Kit very peculiarly. Since when Well, since after the Choice. When she lost out, they built her a place of her own. Kit stood there with his mouth open and didn t care who saw him. Why in the One s Name did they do that he said. Quelt looked at him with some confusion. Well, she had bound herself into the world, and when she lost, she couldn t dissolve that relationship. She was stuck here. So they made her a place to stay. It s very nice; it s a few thousand miles from here. That s where you go for an Own Choice, when you re a wizard here. We go see her, and have a good talk with her, and tell her she should have behaved herself. Kit looked at Quelt in astonishment. And you just walked away from that little conversation without having any further trouble Kit said. Well, yes, Quelt said. Why not Kit was utterly dumbfounded. He looked at Ponch, who was eyeing him with some moderate confusion himself. Come on! Kit said, and headed off. Ponch ran after him, leaving Quelt gazing after them. Well, she said to no one in particular, no help with the laundry this morning, I see… Kit made his way straight back to the great Display, via his beam-me-up-Scotty spell, into which he had laid the Display s coordinates. There s something I m looking for, he said to Ponch as they popped out in the early morning over the crystalline pool. Tell me about it. What we re seeing here, down below… Ponch s answer was a few minutes in coming. They decided, here, what the rest of this world s life would look like, Ponch said. Is that right That s part of it, Kit said. Ponch looked up at him with an expression that was both quizzical and somehow sad. But not all. No, Kit said. Standing there on the brink of the interface, he hesitated, and then sat down in the grass and flowers. Ponch sat down beside him, his tongue hanging out, still giving Kit that uncertain look. You understand it, Ponch said. Make me understand it, too. I think it s important. Kit pulled his knees up, wrapped his arms around them. The universe is running down, he said. It s the Lone Power s doing. It invented entropy, the Great Death that s the shadow over all the smaller ones. Whether the results of that invention are all bad Kit shrugged. It gets too complicated to just say yes or no. But wizards do what they can to slow down the speed of energy running out of the world, that s all. Ponch had looked away and was gazing down into the Display. I think I understand that. Okay. When enough members of a species get to the point where they know they re alive, and they know they can think when they start to understand the world around them, and they realize they can do something about it one way or another then they re offered the Choice. As a species, they can elect to slow down the Great Death, or at least try to slow it down. Or else they can just give in and decide to do nothing about it. They can even go over to Its side, the Lone Power s side, and help make the worlds die faster… Ponch shuddered. How can they do that ! I ve never been real clear about that myself, Kit said. How can they do it How can someone be angry enough, or crazy enough, to say, Sure, if things are going to hell anyway, let s have them go there faster Sometimes it looks like a species can get tricked into it, Kit said. When a Choice happens, there are always representatives from Life s side and Death s side to argue the case. And there are always wizards there: sometimes a lot, sometimes just a few, or even just one. But finally it comes down to what the species itself decides, through its representatives at the Choice. If the Lone One offers them something they like the sound of better than they like the sound of what Life s offering and they go for it, then… Kit shook his head. Then bad things happen to that species, Ponch said. He was still looking down into the Display. Kit glanced over at him, wondering what was going on. Ponch was usually more voluble than this, even when he was upset. That s right, Kit said. And usually bad stuff happens to the other species around them, too, if the one making the Choice has the biggest population of sentient beings on that planet. If they already had death to begin with, then it tends to get a lot worse than just their bodies stopping, or whatever. If they didn t have death…they get it. It was some seconds before Ponch said anything else. Finally, he lifted his head and looked Kit in the eyes again. That s awful. Kit nodded. So all the people in that world have to deal with the results of that Choice until their species ends, he said. And wizards get born to try to make it better, if it went badly. You could say that a wizard s Ordeal is his own version of that Choice. Kit smiled, a small smile and not a happy one. Whether we like it or not, it looks like it s Choices all the way down… Ponch flicked an ear at the Display. Including down there. Definitely down there, Kit said. Most species only have old stories about their Choices, and it s hard to tell whether everything in the stories is true. These guys He shook his head. It s pretty unusual to have such a clear telling. It s nice for the Alaalids. But I can t get over the idea that there s something missing. Something they ve left out Maybe. Yeah. Or else something they didn t think was important. What I wish I could see…is that left-out part. Ponch looked stumped. Let me think about that for a moment, he said. That, Kit thought. The part with the Lone One. In all other Choices that I ve seen, It s been the major player. In world after world, It haunts even the species that came close to winning their Choices. But this one…He sat down. This species has death. They accepted that part of the Lone Power s gift even before the Choice process began. So the heart of their own Choice, and something they accepted or threw out has to be even more important than death. Kit stood there in the bright day, turning that over and over in his mind. Something more important for this species than life and death. More important than what comes after it. What could that be Ponch looked up at him. The thing you want to see, he said, I can take you there. Do it! Together they walked down into the crystal. Once again they found the eight characters of the Choice waiting for them. But this time the air of the past, or the past-made-present, wasn t quite so pellucid. There was uncertainty in it, a kind of haze. Where is that haze coming from Kit said. Me, possibly, Ponch said. But pay attention. I don t know if I can do this more than once. The Lone Power and Druvah had stepped aside, and Kit and Ponch stood nearby, watching, listening. You are the wise one, the Lone Power was saying. You know what day your people are coming to, in the far future. You know to what place they will come: the place from which they will not be able to move without help. My help. I m not so sure about that, Druvah said. I think our Choice will still remain our own. Now tell me what you want. The destruction of hopes, It said. The devaluation of life. The end of things, early or late. The dissolution of the created. What else No, Druvah said. I mean, what do you want of me You wouldn t have called me aside unless I had the ability to do something you want. I want you to let me into the heart of things, It said. You want me to betray my people, Druvah said. Nothing of the kind! But I can give you the power to make sure they won t destroy themselves. They will, eventually. You know it. They re very happy with the way they are. But to every species comes a time when the way they are is not enough…when if they re going to go on living, they have to become something more, something different from what they ve always been. If your fellow wizards enact the wizardry they re building at the moment, they ll also find that they ve built themselves a trap from which there s no escape. And you know that s what they re doing, too. You re trying to save them. But they re not listening to you. They re likely to listen to me even less, Druvah said, if I talk to you much longer. Why should you care about that Ictanik said. You re the oldest of the wizards on this world, the wisest and the strongest. And you re the power source for this spell, the one without whom a wizardry of this scope and importance simply can t happen. If they become offended, why, you just walk away from the spell And leave the future of my world unprotected from disasters and pain and sudden death, and alienated from the One Druvah said. I don t think so. Whatever the One may do for you, Ictanik said, without me included in your world, your species will never be able to change, or grow. I suspect that to be true, Druvah said, and for the first time, he looked troubled. But I don t trust you. There I can help you, Ictanik said. I will gladly give you enough power so that, for the rest of your life, if indeed you don t trust me, you can step in to right whatever wrongs you think have been done. Druvah was silent for a while, gazing off into the distance. Then he looked up again. You re very cunning, he said. But what s one lifetime against the lifetime of a world I m not so irresponsible as to cast away responsibility for what happens in Alaalu after I leave it. If you re going to give me power in return for changes I make in the wizardry we re about to work, then it will be this way that by your gift, I ll be able to live here in the state of being I please, in the shape and way I please, until the last of the Alaalids passes from the world. Uh-oh, Kit thought. He recognized the veiled cruelty in the smile on the Lone One s face, having seen it before. Whatever Druvah was asking for, it was something that the Lone Powe