Kont’ Raen laughed and won tine next hand.

“You should have taken it,” an azi said to Jim that night. “Kontrin don’t sell their azi when they’re done with them. They terminate them, whatever their age. It’s their law.”

Jim shrugged. He had heard so already. Everyone had had, to tell him so. He worked the dice in his clenched hand. and sat down on the matting of the azi quarters. He cast them again and again obsessively, trying the combinations as if some magic could change them. He no longer had duties on the ship. The Kontrin had marked his fatigue and bought him free of duties. He was no longer subject to ration: if he wanted more than his meals, he did not have to rely on tips to buy that extra He seldom chose to go beyond ration, all the same, gave once or twice when he had been far ahead and his appetite improved. He cast the dice now, against some vague superstition formed of these empty days. He played himself, to test his run of luck.

He could not have quit, the game unfinished, could not go back to the others, to being one of them, and exist without knowing what he had given up. He would always think that he might have been free and rich. That would always torment him. The Kontrin had sensed this, and therefore she had laughed. Even he could understand the irony.

iv

Andra’s Jewelreached Silak and, docked. Ship will continue to Istra, the message flashed to the three passengers who should have disembarked there with the others, to seek connections further. So grand a ship as Andra’s Jeweldid not make out-planet runs with her staterooms empty. But the passengers who had packed, unpacked, with the desperate fear that they would do better to disembark anyway and seek other transportation, however long they had to wait. A few more passengers boarded. The Jewelvoyaged out, ghostly in her emptiness.

“It’s the Kontrin,” the ITAK envoy whispered to his wife. “She’s going to Istra.”

The woman, his partner-in-office, said nothing, but glanced anxiously at the intercom and its blank screen, as if this might be carried to other ears.

“What other answer?” The Istran shaped the words with his lips, soundlessly. “And why would they come in person? In person, after all?”

The woman regarded him in dread. Their mission to Meron, dismal failure, had been calamity enough. It was their misfortune that they had chosen the Jewelfor their intermediate link to Silak—tempted by the one brief extravagance of their lives, compensation for their humiliation on Meron. They were executives in a world corporation; they had attempted to travel a few days in the grand style of their innerworld counterparts, once, once, to enjoy such things, foreseeing ruin awaiting them on Istra. “We should have gotten off this ship at Silak,” she said, “while we had the chance. There’s only Pedra now, and no regular lines from there. We should have gotten off. Now it’s impossible she wouldn’t take notice of it. She surely knows we’re Istran.”

“I don’t see,” he said, “how she could be involved with us. I don’t. She’s from beforeMeron. Unless—while we were stalled on Meron—some message went through to Cerdin. I asked the azi where she boarded. They said Kalind. That’s only one jump from Cerdin.”

“You shouldn’t have asked the azi.”

“It was a casual question.”

“It was dangerous.”

“It was—”

“Hush! not so loud.”

They both looked at the intercom, uncomfortable in its cyclopsic presence. “It’s not live,” he said.

“I think she owns this ship,” the woman said. “That’s why there aren’t any guards visible. The whole crew, the azi—”

“That’s insane.”

“What else, then? What else makes sense?”

He shook his head. Nothing did.

v

They reached barren Pedra, and took on a straggle of lower-deck passengers, who gaped in awe at the splendour of the accommodations. Nothing the size of the Jewelhad ever docked at Pedra. There were no upper-deck passengers: one departed here, but none boarded.

The game stood at four hundred eighteen to four hundred twelve. Bets had spread among the free crew. Some of them came and watched as the azi’s lead increased to thirteen. It was the widest the game had ever been spread.

“Your luck is incredible,” the Kontrin said. “Do you want to quit?”

“I can’t,” Jim said.

The Kontrin nodded slowly, and ordered drinks for them both.

Andra’s Jewelmade out from sunless Pedra and jumped again. They were in Istran space, beta Hydri two, snake’s-tail, the Outside’s contact point with the Reach.

There were, after the disorientation of jump, a handful of days remaining.

The game stood at four hundred fifty-nine to four hundred fifty-one. Midway through the evening it was four hundred sixty-two to four hundred fifty-three, and there was still a deep frown on the face of Kont’ Raen. She cast the wands governing aspect of the dice. They turned up star, star, and black. The aspects were marginally favourable. With black involved, she could have declined the hand and cancelled it, passing the wands to Jim for a new throw. She simply declined the first cast of the dice. The azi threw six and she threw twelve: she won the star and it took next star automatically. twenty-four. The azi declined first throw on the deadly black. She threw four; the azi threw twelve. The azi had won black, cancelling his points in the game. A low breath hissed from the gallery.

“Do you concede?” Kont’ Raen asked.

Jim shook his head. He was tired; his position in this game was all but hopeless: her score was ninety-eight; his was zero…but it was his option, and he never conceded any game, no matter how long and wearing. Neither did she. She inclined her head in respect to his tenacity and yielded him the wands. His control of the hand, should black turn up, afforded him a marginal chance of breaking her score.

And suddenly there was a disturbance at the door.

Two passengers stood there, male and female, betas. The azi of the salon, so long without visitors to serve of evenings, took an instant to react. Then they hurried about preparing chairs and a table for the pair, taking their order for drinks.

The game continued. Jim threw two ships and a star. He won the ships and had twenty; Raen won the star and took game.

“Your hundred fifty-four,” she said quietly, “to your four hundred fifty-two.”

Jim nodded.

“Take first throw.”

He shook his head; one could refuse a courtesy. She gathered up the wands.

A chair moved. One of the passengers was coming over to them. Raen hesitated in her cast and then looked aside in annoyance, the wands still in her hand.

“I am ser Merek Eln,” the man said, and gestured back to the woman who had also risen. “Sera Parn Kest my wife.”

Raen inclined her head as if this were of great moment to her. The betas seemed to miss the irony. “Kont’ Raen a Sul,” And with cold courtesy. “Grace to you both.”

“Are you…bound for Istra?”

Raen smiled, though coldly. “Is there anything more remote?”

Merek Eln blinked and swallowed. “The ship must surely start its return there. Istra is the edge of the Reach.”

“Then that must be where I am bound.”

“We…are in ITAK, Istran Trade…”

“…Association, Kontrin-licensed. Yes. I’m familiar with the registered corporations.”

“We offer our assistance, our—hospitality.”

Raen looked him up and down, and sera Kest also. She let the silence continue. “How kind,” she said at last. “I’ve never had such an offer. Perhaps I’ll take advantage of it. I don’t believe there are other Kontrin on Istra.”

“No,” Eln said faintly. “Kontrin, if you would care to discuss the matter which brings you here—”

“I don’t.”

“We might…assist you.”