"Yes. In one way or another." Cirocco scowled. "Much as I hate her, I can't lay all the blame at her feet. The human race never did learn to live with the Bomb. It would have happened sooner or later."

"Did she drop the first bomb?" Conal asked. "The one on Australia?"

"No. She wouldn't have dared that. My ... informant thinks it's likely Gaea engineered the accident.

"I saw a shark-feeding frenzy once, a long time ago. That's what Gaea did. She saw this immense tank full of hungry sharks, millions of them. So she let some blood into the water. So they murdered each other. They were ready to; Gaea simply goaded them. Later, when the sentinel ship out here had been withdrawn, when the War showed signs of letting up, she would drop one of her own bombs in the right place and it would start up again. So she directly murdered a few billion."

"You're not talking about eggs now," Robin said. "Real atomic bombs? I didn't know Gaea had any."

"Why shouldn't she? She's had a century to acquire them, and there are people willing to sell. But she didn't need to do that. She can make her own. For a long time Gaea has been vulnerable. One very large fusion bomb could destroy this world. It was never in the cards that she'd sit still for that. So the war was in her interest. The combatants by now are at the point where they have no hope of ever hitting her-and some attempts have been made. A couple dozen missiles have started out in this direction. None have made it any farther than the orbit of Mars. She takes care of them easily."

She settled back into her chair and waited for questions. There were none for a long time. At last Nova looked up.

"Where did you learn all this, Cirocco?"

Good question, kid. Cirocco rubbed slowly at her upper lip and studied Nova through slitted eyes until the girl looked away, uneasy.

"I can't tell you right now. You'll just have to take my word for it."

"Oh, I didn't mean I-"

"You have every right to wonder. All I can do is ask you to remember our oath, and take it on faith for now. I promise you'll know all I know before I ask you to lay your life on the line."

And I will too, Gaby, she thought. Her biggest fear was that, in the end, Gaby would appear only to her.

"Can you tell us your plans?" Hornpipe asked.

"That I can do. In great and tedious detail. I suggest that beakers be filled, chairs pushed back, and cheese and crackers brought for those who can still find the odd corner of tummy to put them. This is going to take quite a while, and it's as crazy as anything that's gone before."

It did take a long time. After five revs they were still debating this or that point of the broad outline, but the plan itself had been sold.

By that time Nova was snoring in her chair. Cirocco envied her. She herself did not expect to sleep for a kilorev.

EIGHT

Cirocco left the table and climbed the main staircase of the big house, up to the third floor, which seldom saw use. Up here was a room Chris had set aside for her long ago. She did not know the impulse that had made him designate it "Cirocco's Room." He had been doing strange things at that time, like building the copper-clad shrine to Robin.

The room had bare wood floors and white walls and one window with a black shade which could be drawn. The only furnishing was a simple iron bed, painted white. The mattress was fat, bulging, stuffed with feathers. It was always made up neatly with bleached white sheets and one pillow, and it was so high she could see the springs beneath the mattress, and the floor under that. The only spot of color in the room was the brass doorknob.

It was a room where nothing could hide, or be hidden. It was a wonderful place to sit and think. With the shade drawn there were no distractions.

The light coming through the window reminded her of early morning. She remembered all-night sessions at college, returning to her room in light like this. There was the same pleasant weariness, the same ferment of ideas tossed back and forth, ideas still running around in her head.

It was not morning, of course. It was timeless afternoon.

Ciocco was used to that.

She missed little things. Sometimes she longed to see the stars again. Falling stars, making a wish.

She sat on the edge of the bed. What do you wish for, Cirocco? There's no falling star, but make a wish anyway, who's keeping track?

Well, someone to share this with would be nice.

She felt ungrateful as soon as she thought it. She had friends, the best in the world. She had always been lucky with friends. So the burden was shared.

But there was a special sharing she had missed. Many times she thought it might be possible, this might be the man. What is this thing called love? Maybe she didn't know. She had lived long enough that she had run out of fingers to count the almost-loves. The first one, when she was fourteen. The guy in college ... what was his name?

Thinking back, she wondered if that was her last chance. As a Captain and a candidate for command, there hadn't been room for that. Plenty of lovers, in the physical sense, but falling in love would have endangered her plans. As a Wizard ... something was always in the way.

She'd even been willing to stretch a point. When Mr. Right didn't show up, why not Ms. Right? She had been so close with Gaby. It might have worked. And all the dear Titanides. Twice she had borne children, once in the Titanide way, with another as the hindmother. Once in the human way, nurturing him in her own body. She had not thought of him in a long time. He went back to Earth, and he never wrote. Now he was dead.

All right, Cirocco, so much for that wish. That three wishes business doesn't work on stars-which you didn't even see anyway-but we'll stretch a point and give you two for the price of one.

She realized that just having a lover would help.

It would be so easy to do.

She wiped a tear from her cheek. Five Titanides down there. Any one of them would gladly be her lover-in the frontal mode, too, which they did not do lightly. But it had been decades since she had made love to a Titanide. It wasn't fair. All she had to do was put herself in their place and ask a simple question. Could they say no?

Conal... .

She went to her knees on the floor and sat there. Her face was wet with tears now.

Conal was and always had been hers for the asking. And she could never, never take him to bed. She had only to think of what she had done to him and she felt sick. No man should have his dignity stripped from him like that. To become his lover after such a thing was a grotesquerie she could not imagine.

Robin ... was so sweet Cirocco could hardly believe it. What a cast-iron, short-fused, piss and vinegar bitch she had been twenty years ago! Any sane person would have said she should have been drowned at birth. That's probably why Cirocco had liked her so much. But with Robin there had never been that spark of attraction, not even as much as there had been with Gaby. Which was just as well. Robin was going to have enough trouble with Conal without an aging Wizard getting in her hair.

She put her hands on the cool, shiny, smooth boards of the floor and lowered herself until her cheek touched it. Her vision was blurred. She sniffed, and rubbed her nose, and wiped her eyes, and looked dully along the floor to the crack of light under the door. There was not a speck of dust to be seen. There was the smell of wood polish, sharp and lemony. She relaxed, and then her shoulders started to shake.

Nova ...

Oh, god, she didn't want to be Nova's lover. She wanted to be Nova. Be eighteen years old, fresh and nubile and innocent and in love. In love with a tired old hag. It was bound to end in misery. But what a ... sweet misery it seemed to be young and having one's heart broken for the first time.