Time passed. Seconds? Fractions of seconds? Certainly not minutes. There couldn't be that much air.

The ship had stopped rocking, thank Stratos, or the shifting cargo would have quickly ground her to paste. Even with the coal bed lying still, nearly every square inch of her body felt crushed and scraped by jagged rocks. With nothing to do but inventory agonies, Maia found it possible to distinguish subtle differences in texture. Each chunk pressing her body had a sadistic personality so individual she might give it a name . . . this one, Needle; that one under her left breast, Pincher; and so on.

As fractions stretched into whole seconds and more, she grew aware of one, unique point of contact — a tight, throbbing constriction that felt smooth but rhythmically adamant. With shock, she realized someone was holding onto her leg! Hope coursed through Maia that she had been tossed upside down, leaving a foot exposed, and those pulsating squeezes meant help was coming!

Then she realized. It's the big sailor!

His hand must have connected with her foot at the last moment, while she swam the carbon tide. Now, whether conscious or dying, the man maintained this thin thread of human contact through their common tomb.

How ironic. Yet it seemed no more bizarre than anything else right now. It was company.

Maia felt sorry for Leie, when the news came. She'll imagine the end was more horrible than it is. It could be worse. I can't think how right now, but I'm sure it could be worse.

As she pondered that, the pulsing grip around her ankle tightened abruptly, spasmodically, clenching so hard that Maia moaned in fierce new pain. She felt the sailor's terrible convulsions, and his reflexive strength yanked her downward, stabbing her in a hundred places, making her gasp in anguish. Then the fierce grip began subsiding in a chain of diminishing tremors.

The throbbing constrictions stopped. Maia imagined she heard a distant rattle.

See? she told herself, as hot tears swept her eyes in total darkness. I told you. I told you it could be worse.

Quietly, she prepared for her own turn. The scientio-deist liturgy of her upbringing rose in her mind — catechistic lines Lamatia Hold dutifully taught its summer children in weekly chapel services, about the formless, maternal spirit of the world, at once loving, accepting, and strict.

For what hope hath a single, living "me,"

A mind, brief, yet self-important? Clinging

After life like a possession? Some thing she can keep?

She knew prayers for comfort, prayers for humility. But then, Maia wondered, if the soul field really does continue after organic life has ceased, what difference would a few words, mumbled in the dark mean to Stratos Mother? Or even the strange, all-seeing thunder god said to be worshiped privately by men? Surely neither of them would hold it against her if she saved her breath to live a few seconds longer?

Perceptory overload gradually shut down part of her agony. The claustrophobic pressure surrounding Maia, at first a horrid mass of biting claws, now had a numbing effect, as if satisfied to slowly crush all remaining sensation. The only impression increasing with time was of sound. Thumps and distant, dragging clatters.

Heartbeats passed, one by one. She counted them, at first to pass the time. Then incredulously, because they showed no imminent sign of stopping. Experimenting, Maia opened her mouth slightly, exposing her tongue and inner lips to sense what her battered, dust-covered face could not — a faint thread of cool air that seemed to stream down the shovel blade from somewhere near her hairline!

Yet, there had to be at least a meter of coal overhead. Probably much more!

There was no easy answer to this puzzle, and she tried not to think too hard. Even when Maia made out footsteps crunching overhead, and the hurried scrape of tools, she paid scant heed, clinging to the blanket of numb acceptance. Hope, if it raised her metabolism, was the last thing she needed right now.

Maybe it would be better if I slept awhile.

So Maia drifted in and out of anoxic slumber, vibrations along the shovel blade telling her how slow the progress of the rescuers remained. As if it matters.

Without warning, the tool shifted, and the blade that had succored her suddenly threatened to gouge her neck, causing Maia to squirm in terror. All at once, the black swaddling of coal became more tight, constricting, suffocating, than ever. Hysteria, so long held at bay by resigned numbness, sent tremors of resurgent fury coursing through her pinned arms and legs. Maia desperately fought a rising in her gorge.

Then, unexpected and unbidden, light struck her eyes with abrupt, painful brilliance, outbalancing even clawing panic, driving out all thoughts with its sheer, blinding beauty. Uncovered, her ears filled with noise — rattles, rasps, and hoarse shouts. Maia took long, shuddering gasps as blurry shapes congealed into silhouettes and finally soot-streaked faces, starkly outlined by swaying bulbs. On their knees, sailors and passengers used bare hands to clear more coal away from her head. Someone with a rag and bucket cleaned her eyes, nose, and mouth, then gave her water.

Finally, Maia was able to choke out words. "Don't . . . b-bother . . . w-w-me." She shook her head, cutting fresh scrapes along her neck. "Ma . . . man . . . down . . . right."

It came out barely a gargle, but they acted as if they understood, commencing to dig furiously where Maia indicated with her chin. Meanwhile, others more gradually liberated the rest of her. When she was almost free, an overturned yellow bucket came into view below, and the work went even faster.

At that point, Maia could have saved them effort. The hand still clutching her ankle was growing cold. Yet she could not bring herself to say it. There was always a chance. …

She had never known his name. He was not even a member of her race. Still, tears flowed when she saw his purple face and bulging eyes. Hands pried his fingers off her leg, and with that break of contact she knew with tragic certainty and unwonted loss that they would never again share communication, this side of death.

Seabirds cried possessive calls of territoriality, warning others of their kind to keep away from private nesting niches, chiseled in the steep bluffs overlooking Grange Head harbor. Jealous of their neighbors, the birds virtually ignored a small group of bipeds who swung along the cliffs, hanging from slender ropes, taking turns harvesting molted feathers in great bags and alternately chipping still more roosts for this year's crop of mating pairs. From a distance, or even from the birds' close vantage point, no one could distinguish among the sunburned, narrow-boned, black-haired women performing these strange tasks. They all looked identical.

Idly, without much interest, Maia watched the harvester family labor along those vertiginous heights, working their feather farm. It was a niche, all right. Not one she'd ever be tempted to fill. Yet, something equally at the fringe was probably her destiny now. All the fond hopes and ambitious schemes of childhood lay broken, and her heart was numb.

With a heavy sigh she looked at the figures she had scratched on her slate. The calculations needed no further massaging. Gingerly, because each movement still caused her pain, she flipped the tablet over and slid it across the chart table.

"I'm done, Captain Pegyul."

The tall sallow-faced sailor looked up from his own figures and stared at her a moment. He scratched behind his battered green cap. "Well, give me another minute, then, will yer?"

Sitting on a railing nearby, Naroin the bosun puffed her pipe and gave Maia a headshake. Don't show up officers. That would be her advice.

What do I care? Maia responded with a shrug. With the navigator and second mate lost in the storm, and the first mate in bed with a concussion, there had been only one person aboard able to help Wotan's master pilot this tub. Struggling to turn a hobby into a useful skill, Maia had quickly learned why tradition demanded more than one eye at a sextant, to cross-check each measurement. The custom proved valid during the last two dreadful weeks, retracing their way back on course. Each of them had made mistakes often enough to cause disaster, if the other hadn't been there to notice.