She pulled back a bit from my neck so she could look me in the eye. "You are the Little Father Without Blame," she said. "You’re more than we hoped, and more than you know. Just for tonight, I wish I were your own species… so you’d stop treating me like some child you mustn’t corrupt. I was raised by humans, Teelu; I’m not as naive as you think."

Once more she leaned in for a kiss: light, quick, on my cheek, then she slipped softly out of my arms. I let her go, stunned by what she was suggesting. I couldn’t, I couldn’t, I couldn’t — for all that she was a grown-up of her species, she didn’t know… she was confused by the smell of venom, that had to be it. And by her human upbringing. After years of hume stories like "Snow White" and "Cinderella," Counselor might fantasize about offering herself to some Prince Charming; but Mandasars didn’t really feel… they didn’t really want…

Did they?

She was still very close, near enough that I could smell her soft ginger scent; and she was waiting for me to call her back. To reach for her hand or her kiss. But it wouldn’t be right. Whatever she thought she wanted, it truly wasn’t in her nature. I couldn’t take advantage of her, no matter how soothing it would be just to give in, surrender, get lost in the dark.

Counselor must have seen the decision on my face because she sighed quietly — a human sigh, yet another mannerism she must have picked up from the people who raised her. "Teelu" she murmured, "may I at least accompany you on your journey? To Troyen?"

"It’ll be dangerous," I said. "They’re still at war."

"All the more reason for me to go. You humans will be conspicuous and perhaps treated as enemies. I won’t attract as much attention."

"Yes, you will," I told her. "There are so many things you were never taught. Ways to behave. And habits you’ve picked up that just aren’t Mandasar. You’d stand out as badly as any human."

"Not if you teach me. The voyage to Troyen takes ten days — I can learn quickly. I’ll study with you every waking second."

"But if I let you come," I said, "then Zeeleepull would want to go too. And Hib Nib Pib."

"Well, of course," she answered, as if that had never been in doubt. "We all have to go." She fluttered her whiskers teasingly. "You wouldn’t want to recruit me off by myself, would you?" The fluttering stopped. "Would you?"

Her last "would you?" was so wistful — as if she still hoped I might take her seriously. I couldn’t possibly… not because she was an alien, but because she was so young and innocent.

And because in my head I might be thinking of other women besides her.

If I told that to Counselor straight out, it would hurt her feelings; so I decided to give her one thing when I couldn’t give the other.

"All right," I said. "I’ll talk to Admiral Ramos about taking your hive to Troyen."

Immediately there was a cheer — not from Counselor but from four other voices. Zeeleepull and the workers tumbled out of the next room, all glee and triumph. "Troyen!" Zeeleepull yelled. "Troyen going, Troyen seeing, Troyen going, Troyen seeing…"

He might have been singing. And dancing. It’s hard to tell with Mandasars.

"I told you she could make Teelu say yes," Hib whispered, elbowing Nib proudly. "And she didn’t even have to sleep with him."

"Don’t you know anything?" Nib answered. "She wanted to sleep with him."

"After all," Pib added, "he’s a king."

Festina came back the next day at noon. By then the workers had packed, Counselor had arranged for neighboring hives to look after the vegetable fields, and Zeeleepull had made a complete nuisance of himself, getting in everybody else’s way.

Of all of the kids, he was the most excited — telling me things he wanted to see on Troyen, places he wanted to go, stuff he wanted to do. After a while I just had to say, "You realize if we’re lucky, we’ll never set foot on the planet. Radio the missing Explorers, pick them up, fly away. No going down ourselves unless there’s a problem."

"But Troyen is," he insisted. "Is Troyen. Is home."

"Was home," I said. "Nobody knows what-all’s been destroyed in the past twenty years. Buildings bombed. Famous art burned or stolen. Even natural scenery gets wrecked or covered with ugly-looking bunkers. Whatever you think you’ll see, it’s not there anymore."

He refused to listen. Of all the people in his hive, Zeeleepull had the most romantic notions about the planet he’d left as a hatchling. He told me he’d been brought up by elderly human sisters, Willa and Walda, who’d devoted themselves to raising the boy in accordance with his sacred heritage. The way he spoke of them, I just knew the women didn’t have a clue what they were talking about — their heads had got crammed with off-kilter ideas about Troyen, sparked by a ten-day trip they’d made in their thirties. That trip must have been the one impulsive thing the sisters had ever done, and they’d built their lives around it ever after… which explains why they leapt at the chance to take a baby Mandasar under their roof and acquaint him with his fabulous culture.

No wonder Zeeleepull spoke such bad Troyenese. And worse English. He’d come to human language very late, because the sisters didn’t want to "pollute his mental development with contaminating influences." When they finally realized he had to learn English to communicate with his fellow Mandasars — the other kids spoke English 99 percent of the time — Willa and Walda encouraged Zeeleepull to use English words but Troyenese syntax, so he wouldn’t "warp his brain’s neural connections" with an alien grammar.

I got the feeling Zeeleepull could speak normal English if he wanted to, but now he was making a political point. He’d even persuaded his fellow warriors to speak the same way, especially when they were out on maneuvers together. Like a secret code that proved you belonged to the club.

It didn’t hurt that Counselor and the workers loved Zeeleepull to pieces for the bullheaded way he stuck to his twisted-up word structures. Us guys — even when we’re big red platonic lobsters — we put on silly poses to impress the girls.

No rutabagas got weeded that day — when Festina’s skimmer set down on the road, every Mandasar in the valley was there to watch. A big colorful horde of them, reds and whites and browns, all jostled each other for the best view. It reminded me of something Sam said as we watched a riot from my palace balcony: "Like a water tank in a seafood restaurant: lobsters crammed in shoulder to shoulder." When I thought about it now, it’d been a cruel, mean thing for Sam to say… but she had a point. Mandasars cram together a lot; they like it. They’re the sort of species who snuggle together all the time — who bed down in a huddle, and who press into a single corner of a room rather than spacing themselves evenly around. Even these kids raised by humans… you’d think they’d be taught to maintain some personal distance, but there they were on the road, practically crawling on top of each other as the skimmer settled down to the pavement. Even so, they managed to skootch together a little more to clear a path for me up to the side hatch.

The hatch opened. Festina hopped out and smiled when she saw me. "Edward! You’re looking better. Good. Great. Very fine." She was eyeing me up and down. "You had us worried when you passed out last night."

"I wasn’t worried," said a voice inside the skimmer. "He was just exhausted." Kaisho’s wheelchair floated into the sunlight and lowered itself to the road. Her hair looked beautifully combed this morning — combed so it covered her face like a silver-black veil, very neat and glossy. Even the Balrog looked well-groomed. Under the bright orange sun, you couldn’t tell Kaisho’s legs glowed on their own; they just looked like thick beds of moss, as unthreatening as red pillows.