and pain, and the Lone Power has Its way with Life And here Kit covered his face, for he remembered the look on Quelt s face when he d told her about his world. Do you want to I don t want to go back to anything, Quelt said. I want to go forward. To the thing that waits. The stir and hush that went through that vast emptiness was awful. I m afraid, said one voice, trembling. I m afraid! said another, and I m afraid, too! said another voice yet, and another yet, and whole crowds of voices together, and choruses of them, cities of them, nations of them. Afraid, afraid, we re afraid! The roar rose to a shout, the shout to a rumble like an earthquake all around them. Finally, in a great voice, Quelt cried, SO AM I! Slowly silence fell again. But I m going to do it anyway, Quelt said. So that we can all make the leap together. Think about it! One way or another, we ve all got to die eventually. That part of the Choice was never in doubt if we were going to live in Time. Now we can go forward and find another way to do it. If we fail, what s the worst that can happen We all go down into the darkness at once. But we ll still be together. And even in the darkness, there s still the One! At that, the Lone One turned Its face away, and Nita thought she heard teeth grinding. And if this succeeds, Quelt said, we ll all be together, and go on into She shook her head. There aren t words. I don t think there can be. But every one of you has looked up, or out, sometime, and thought, There s something else that s supposed to happen. What is it This is it! This is the something else! Let s go! The roar died back, slowly, to a murmur again. There was no great cry of acclamation, no uproar of acceptance. Her people were, indeed, too afraid. But Nita could feel the change in the air, and glancing over at Kit, she knew that he could, too. It s happening, Nita thought in silent wonder. And, holidays aside, this is why the Powers That Be sent us here. Because even if they d told Quelt Themselves, face-to-face, what needed to happen, she wouldn t have believed Them. The proof had to come through someone she knew personally, someone she liked. Strangers just passing through, people with no agenda. Somebody she sat on the beach with and talked to about nothing important, at dawn. Us… Quelt waited until the silence fell. More and more strongly through it, strongly enough for even Ponch to feel it, so that he sat there wagging his tail, the silent acquiescence grew. It was another of those out-of-time moments that might have lasted an hour, or a day, or a month: In this otherworldly worldheart, there was no telling. But there came a time when the acceptance was complete, and when that happened, Quelt moved slowly to the center of it all, where Druvah stood, and held out her hands. He gave her Alaalu s kernel. She turned it over in her hands a few times, regarding it, and then looked up and around. We made a Choice once, as wizards, for our people, Quelt said. Druvah said, We did. And the Choice can be unmade, Quelt said, by all the living wizards of Alaalu, unanimously. Druvah said, So the original structure of the Choice was built. Then it s time to unbuild it, Quelt said. I am all the living wizards of Alaalu. I say now to the Choice that was made, be unmade in this regard: that our people may go, not merely our own way, but the whole way, the way that lay in the One s mind before we could perceive it clearly! The silence became complete. Kit and Nita stood there waiting for whatever would happen. The Lone Power turned Its back on the proceedings, though It moved no farther. It started to get brighter, in the world inside the world. The radiance from that dazzling and impossible sky began to build, thickening in the air around them the way a low cloud thickens into mist near the ground, but here that mist was radiance that washed out colors in light, starting to dissolve away the outlines and details of things as it grew. Nita glanced down at her hands, wondering if she should be nervous about the way they were beginning to refine themselves away into something that was more light than shape Ponch nosed Kit, and put the leash in his hand. We d better get out of here! Seems like a real good idea to me! Kit said. He grabbed Nita s arm. Just before they took a step forward together, she glanced over and caught just a flash of eyes in her direction, as Quelt s arms went around her mother and father, and she buried her face against her mother s shoulder. But she was smiling. And that smile spread to Kuwilin s face, slowly, and then to Demair s, as the two of them looked up and the light indwelling in the world-kernel of Alaalu spread and spread outward from them, flowering into something long awaited, something long denied, blinding Nita stepped quickly forward with Kit and Ponch. Ponch brought them out far above the planet, looking down from space. The shield-spell that Kit had inlaid into Ponch s leash for times like this instantly took hold, protecting the three of them from the cold and the vacuum. There was air, too, which was important, but for the moment, Nita had forgotten to breathe. Below them, the whole surface of the planet was coming alive with lightning strikes. From cloud to cloud, from cloud to earth, they crackled across the day side, the massive discharges clearly visible, and on the night side, the clouds flickered with them like electrified milk. Auroras whipped and crackled at the poles, even lashing up and out along the lines of the planet s magnetic field, and all over the planet, Alaalu s horizon burst out in spiky spurts of blue-jet and red-sprite lightning, and curving prominences of ion-fire. A little leftover Alaalid anger Kit said under his breath. Nita nodded. But I think not for long… Slowly, the atmospheric fury died away. The night sky went quiet first; on the day side, a few genuine lightning bolts, startled out of several great storm systems by the less natural discharges, let themselves loose for several minutes. Things went still. Then, slowly, light began to grow here and there on the world s surface. It was most obvious in the Cities, from which it seemed at first that white fireworks were rocketing upward. But the lights came from scattered islands, even from far out in Alaalu s immense seas…and they were not fireworks. They leaped and curved through the lower atmosphere, yes, but then the lights found their way up and out, and once into space, shot free, like meteors in reverse growing brighter and brighter as they pierced up and out of the atmosphere, shooting up and out of the planet s gravity well, burning brighter still as they fired themselves up and outward into the eternal night. Nita swallowed as the upward-streaking fires increased in number. It was the starfall she had awakened to, late their first night, but in reverse, the stars falling back up into the sky now; and like that other starfall, they fell upward more and more thickly every second, a shower of fire bursting off the planet in every possible direction, out into the unending starlight of space, getting lost in the blinding radiance of Alaalu s sun, or persisting for an amazing time as they streaked out toward the system s heliopause. For what might have been a very long time, or a very short one, Alaalu rained a new kind of life into the night. A billion and a half of them, Nita thought. She knew that for the moment they all had to be at least a little ways outside of Time; otherwise, seeing a billion and a half of anything go by would have taken forever. But this is the day after forever… Slowly, the rain of fire began to taper off. Kit and Nita and Ponch stood there, watching the world go quiet again. Well, Nita said at last, I guess that s it. Wait, Kit said. They waited. That stillness persisted for a little while longer And the planet erupted all over in one last blast of brilliance, with uncounted and uncountable streaks of soulfire piercing upward and out of the heart of the heart of the world, as those who had gone before and had been in the Whispering now erupted into a freedom that only one of them had ever anticipated. Nita and Kit both threw up a hand to shield their eyes as all the rest of the souls who had ever lived on Alaalu departed, in a storm of outward-streaking fire, for a far wider ambit. But at last all the new light died away, leaving them able to look down again at a blue world turning underneath them, a place both very old, and suddenly new. Nita and Kit glanced at each other. Now what Kit said. I guess we go home early, said Nita. Ponch looked at them both reproachfully. Not without my stick! Kit gave Ponch an amused look. We did leave some of our stuff down there, he said. The worldgates and so on. We d better go pack them up and bring them back with us. Yeah, Nita said. Come on, Ponch. They vanished, making their way back to an empty world. Dairine stared into the roiling fire, and at the empty spot in the wizardry across from her. We ve got to get him out of there! she shouted at the others. Filif and Sker ret looked at her, stricken. How Sker ret said anxiously. Filif s nearly out of energy. I can t retool the whole wizardry while we re in here. We ll never last! We ve got to get out, or we ll all No! Dairine gulped. There s still one thing we can try. Spot! Spot popped his lid up. We re not going to lose anybody in my solar system, she said. Not on my watch! Dhhairihn, Filif said, his needles all trembling, what are you I m going to get him out of there, she said. And turned What in the Powers names are you doing said a casual voice, infernally calm, intensely annoying. He came walking up out of the Sun, the way someone would come walking up out of the water occasionally slipping a little to one side or another, blown off kilter by the furious wind inside the Sun, but otherwise unhurt. And slowly the tachocline was beginning to calm. Dairine looked at Roshaun as he ascended calmly and regally back into the wizardry and locked himself once more into the matrix. We should get out of here as quickly as possible, he said, because there are about to be three or four CMEs in rapid succession, and anything in the solar atmosphere that s not Sun is likely to be smashed like an egg within seconds. He looked over at the Rirhait. Sker ret Sker ret said one word. The second after that, they were standing in the incredible darkness of a backyard in suburban Nassau County, and the wizardry that had surrounded them flickered and went out. Dairine staggered out of her place, snapping Spot shut and holding on to him, because if she didn t she would do something else. She was ready to weep with terror and relief, and was intent on not doing so. She lurched toward Roshaun, who stood several paces away from her, and stopped. Why did you do that she shouted at him. Or at least it was meant to be a shout: Her throat seized up on her and it came out as more of a squeak. Roshaun paused for several breaths. Because I didn t have to, he said at last. And he said it in the Speech, so it was true. But his eyes, which would not meet hers, told her that there was more to the matter than that. Still breathing hard from what she d been through, Dairine turned away and walked back to the house, slowly, and went into her room and shut the door. And only then did she allow herself, somewhat later, the very smallest smile. Eventually, Dairine heard the others make their way down into the basement, seeking out their pup tents. She let them do it undisturbed. The morning would be soon enough for debriefings. We ve had enough stress for one night, she thought to herself, as she got undressed and got into bed. But she lay awake in the dark for a long time, considering the annoying economy of the Powers That Be, Who hate wasting anything. And none of this was an accident, she thought. They saw the trouble coming. And we were sent exactly what we needed to prevent a catastrophe.. exactly the right tools for the job. An expert in solar dynamics. A tree who s afraid of any fire but that one. And a fixer par excellence…All crazy people, all with nothing to lose because it s not their world, not their star. And all personally committed beyond even their commitment to the Powers… … because of knowing somebody here. Dairine had no idea when she finally fell asleep. In the morning, the sunlight streaming in her window woke her up…and it was just normal sunlight, not something much more terrible. Spot sat on her desk with his lid open, showing her the SOHO satellite feed, which was showing three of the most spectacular CMEs anyone had ever seen, bubbling off the inward-rotating limb of the Sun in great splendor and fury. But they were decreasing in energy rather than increasing, and the speculation among the satellite people was that the Sun was in for some quiet times ahead. She got up and dressed. And as for me, she thought, maybe some less quiet times. Dairine grinned and went down to say good morning to the houseguests…to one of them in particular. * * * * Epilogue NITA AND KIT WAITED THERE a long while, in the darkness beyond atmosphere, to make sure everything was safe. But, finally, the lights in the sky died down, and there were no more of those fading cries of joy to be heard, no matter how they listened. Space s own silence, briefly jarred out of its ancient composure, reasserted itself. Come on, Nita said silently to Kit. They transited back down to the planet s surface and stood above the house by the sea, looking down at the thatched buildings, the warm lights still in the windows, the flying sheep in the pens, all gathered together; everything looked utterly normal, peaceful. Nita let out a long breath. Peaceful the place might be. But normal They heard nothing but a great silence. It was not merely a matter of sound, but of the effect of many minds that had been in that world but now were gone, gone off to do other business, to live other lives. They left behind them a world that was empty, and strangely innocent and clean: an old world made new. Quietly, the two of them went down to the house and moved through it, looking around one last time. Kit blew out the lamps. Nita went out to the little outbuilding that had been their bedroom and undid the worldgates from the wall, collapsing them. Then, she didn t know why, she folded up the coverlets they had been given and left each of them carefully at the foot of its bed. Afterward Nita went outside, having packed up the pup tents and worldgates, and found Kit over by the pen, letting the ceiff go free. Ponch charged joyously into the pen one last time. The ceiff flew up in a storm of wings, honking, and Ponch chased them down the beach, well into the distance. They ll be okay, Kit said. They were wild a long time before there were any more sentient species here to take care of them. I know, Nita said. They stood there, watching night fall on Alaalu. From Nita s point of view, this was a world she would not be coming back to for a while. It was too full of memories, and too empty now by comparison. And some of the stuff I heard here, she thought, I m going to be digesting for a while… I wouldn t have missed it, Kit said. Not for anything. Nita nodded. They re okay, anyway, she said. Kit laughed softly. Considerably more than okay, he said. Imagine it. Not needing bodies anymore. They ve got a whole world of new worlds to get used to. The silence fell again, and in it there were no whispers, no voices except the most ancient one the immemorial whisper of the tideless Alaalid sea, saying the single word it knew how to say, over and over again. Come on, Kit said. We should get back and see how things are at home. Yeah, Nita said. There was a pause while Kit yelled for Ponch, and Ponch came bouncing back along the beach. Is it time to go home Yeah. Oh, hoy, Ponch barked, dog food again! Kit threw Nita another of those looks that suggested he thought his dog was making fun of him. She rolled her eyes. If there was anything she knew about Ponch today, it was that she understood him even less than she thought she had the day before, but this wasn t necessarily a bad thing. So how do we route this, she said, now that we ve decommissioned the custom gates Kit shrugged. We still have return tickets for the Crossings in our manuals, he said. I guess we just go back to the drop-off point and call for pickup. After that, we route back home through Grand Central. And then he started to laugh. Nita stared at him. Kit was laughing so hard that he had to lean against the rails of the fence. What she said. What is it Oh, jeez, he said, and tried to speak, and then had to stop and give himself over to the laughing again. Nita rolled her eyes and leaned against the fence