The observatory roof rose on steel beams so narrow, it appeared to float. A great telescope had been wheeled to face the south; it bristled with finderscopes and infrared readers and a small flickering monitor screen. Claudia shook her head. "Look at this! If the Queen's spy sees this, the fines will cripple us.

"He won't. Not after the amount of cider he sank tonight."

At first she couldn't even find him. Then a shadow at the window moved and the darkness resolved into a slender shape that straightened from the viewfinder. "Take a look at this, Claudia."

She felt her way across the room, between the cluttered tables, the astrolabe, the hanging globes. Disturbed, a fox cub streaked to the sill.

He caught her arm and guided her to the telescope. "Nebula f345. They call it the Rose."

When she looked in, she could see why. The creamy explosion of stars that filled the dim circle of sky opened like the petals of a vast flower, millennia of light-years across. A flower of stars and quasars, worlds and black holes, its molten heart pulsing with gaseous clouds.

"How far away is it?" she murmured.

"A thousand light-years."

"So what I'm looking at is a thousand years old?"

"Maybe more."

Dazzled, she withdrew her eye from the lens. When she turned to face him, tiny flickers of light blurred her sight, played, over his tangle of dark hair, his narrow face and spare figure, the unlaced tunic under his robe.

"He's brought the wedding forward," she said.

Her tutor frowned. "Yes. Of course."

"You knew?"

"I knew the Earl had been expelled from the Academy." He moved into the candlelight and she saw his green eyes catch the glimmer. "They sent me a message this morning. I guessed this might be the result."

Annoyed, she brushed a pile of papers off the couch onto the floor and sat wearily, swinging her feet up. "Well, you were right. We've got two days. Its not going to be enough, is it?"

He came and sat opposite her. "To finalize tests on the device, no."

"You look tired, Jared Sapiens," she said.

"So do you, Claudia Arlexa."

There were shadows under his eyes and his skin was pale. Gently she said, "You should get more sleep."

He shook his head. "While the universe is out there wheeling over me? Impossible, lady."

She knew it was the pain that kept him awake. Now he called the fox cub and it came and jumped on his lap, rubbing and butting his chest and face. Absently he stroked its tawny back.

"Claudia, I've been thinking about your theory. I want you to tell me about how your engagement was arranged."

"Well, you were here, weren't you?"

He smiled his gentle smile. "It may seem to you as if I've been here forever, but I actually came just after your fifth birthday. The Warden sent to the Academy for the best Sapient available. His daughter's tutor could be nothing less."

Reminded of her father's words, she frowned. Jared looked at her sideways. "Did I say something?"

"Not you." She reached out to the fox but it turned away from her, tucking itself tidily into

Jared's arm. So she said sourly, "Well, it depends which engagement you mean. I've had two."

"The first."

"I can't. I was five. I don't remember it."

"But they betrothed you to the King's son. To Giles."

"As you said, the Warden's daughter doesn't get second best." She jumped up and prowled around the observatory, picking up papers restlessly.

His green eyes watched her. "He was a handsome little boy, I remember."

Her back to him, she said, "Yes. Every year after that the Court painter would send a little picture of him. I've got them all in a box. Ten of them. He had dark brown hair and a kind, sturdy face. He would have been a fine man." She turned. "I only really met him once.

When we went to his seventh birthday party at Court. I remember a boy sitting on a throne too big for him. They had to put a box for his feet. He had big brown eyes. He was allowed to kiss me on the cheek, and he was so embarrassed." She smiled, remembering. "You know how boys go really red. Well, he went scarlet. All he could mumble was, 'Hello, Claudia Arlexa. I'm Giles.' He gave me a bunch of roses. I kept them till they fell to pieces."

She went to the telescope and sat astride the stool, hitching her dress up to her knees.

The Sapient stroked the cub, watching Claudia adjust the eyepiece and gaze through it.

"You liked him."

She shrugged. "You'd never have thought he was the Heir. He was just like any other boy.

Yes, I liked him. We could have gotten along."

"But not his brother, the Earl? Not even then?"

Her fingers turned the fine dials. "Oh him! That twisted grin. No, I knew what he was like straightaway. He cheated at chess and tipped the board over if he was losing. He screamed at the servants, and some of the other girls told me things. When my ... when the Warden came home and told me Giles had died so suddenly ... that all the plans would have to be changed, I was furious." She sat up and turned quickly. "What I swore to you then still goes. Master, I can't marry Caspar. I won't marry him. I detest him."

"Calm down, Claudia."

"How can I!" She was on her feet now, pacing. "I feel as though everything's crashed in on me! I thought we'd have time, but a few days! We have to act, Jared. I have to get into the study, even if your machine is untested."

He nodded. Then he lifted the cub off and dumped it on the floor, ignoring its snarl of dismay. "Come and look at this."

Beside the telescope the monitor nickered. He touched the control and the screen rippled with words in the Sapient tongue of which he had never, for all her pleading, taught her a word. As he scrolled through in a bat whipped through the opened room and vanished back into the night. Claudia glanced around. "We should be careful."

''I'll shut the windows in a moment." Absently Jared stopped the text. "Here." His delicate fingers touched a key and the translation appeared. "Look. This is a fragment of a burned draft of a letter written by the Queen, retrieved and copied by a Sapient spy in the Palace, three years ago. You asked me to find anything that might support your absurd theory—"

"Its not absurd."

"Well, your unlikely theory, then, that Giles's death was—"

"Murder."

"Suspiciously sudden. Anyway, I found this." She almost pushed him aside in her eagerness. "How did you get it?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Secrets of the Wise, Claudia. Let's just say a friend in the

Academy went searching in the archives." As he went to the windows she read the text eagerly.

.. As for the arrangement we spoke of before, it is unfortunate, but great changes often require great sacrifices. G has been kept aloof from others since his father died; the people's grief will be real but short-lived and we can contain it. It barely needs saying that your part will be beyond value to us. When my son is King I can promise you all I...

She hissed in annoyance. "Is that it?"

"The Queen has always been very careful. We have at least seventeen people in the

Palace, but evidence for anything is rare." He slid the last window down, closing out the stars. "That took a lot of finding."

"But it's so clear!" Eagerly she read it again. "I mean ... grief will be real ... When my son is King ..."