When Dirk happened to mention his year on Prometheus, Janacek quickly seized on it. "Tell me, t'Larien," he said, "do you consider the Altered Men human?"

"Of course," Dirk said. "They are. Settled by the Earth Imperials way back during the war. The modern Prometheans are only the descendants of the old Ecological Warfare Corps."

"In truth," Janacek said, "yet I would disagree with your conclusion. They have manipulated their own genes to such a degree that they have lost the right to call themselves men at all, in my opinion. Dragonfly men, undersea men, men who breathe poison, men who see in the dark like Hruun, men with four arms, hermaphrodites, soldiers without stomachs, breeding sows without sentience-these creatures are not men. Or not-men, more precisely."

"No," Dirk said. "I've heard the term not-man. It's

common parlance on a lot of worlds, but it means human stock that's been mutated so it can no longer interbreed with the basic. The Prometheans have been careful to avoid that. The leaders-they're fairly normal themselves, you know, only minor alterations for longevity and such-well, the leaders regularly swoop down on Rhiannon and Thisrock, raiding, you know. For ordinary Earth-normal humans-"

"Yet even Earth is less than Earth-normal these past few centuries," Janacek interrupted. Then he shrugged. "I should not break in, should I? Old Earth is too far away, in any event. We only hear century-old rumors. Continue."

"I made my point," Dirk said. "The Altered Men are still human. Even the low castes, the most grotesque, the failed experiments discarded by the surgeons-all of them can interbreed. That's why they sterilize them, they're afraid of offspring."

Janacek took a swallow of beer and regarded him with those intense blue eyes. "They do interbreed, then?" He smiled. "Tell me, t'Larien, during your year on that world did you ever have occasion to test this personally?"

Dirk flushed and found himself glancing toward Gwen, as if it were somehow all her fault. "I haven't been celibate these past seven years, if that's what you mean," he snapped.

Janacek rewarded his answer with a grin, and looked at Gwen. "Interesting," he said to her. "The man spends several years in your bed and then immediately turns to bestiality."

Anger flashed across her face; Dirk still knew her well enough to recognize that. Jaan Vikary looked none too pleased either. "Garse," he said warningly.

Janacek deferred to him. "My apologies, Gwen," he said. "No insult was intended. T'Larien no doubt acquired a taste for mermaids and mayfly women quite independently of you."

"Will you be going out into the wild, t'Larien?"

Vikary asked loudly, deliberately wrenching the conversation away from the other Kavalar.

"I don't know," Dirk said, sipping his beer. "Should I?"

"I'd never forgive you if you didn't," Gwen said, smiling.

"Then I'll go. What's so interesting?"

"The ecosystem-it's forming and dying, all at the same time. Ecology was a forgotten science in the Fringe for a long time. Even now the outworlds boast less than a dozen trained eco-engineers between them. When the Festival came, Worlorn was seeded with life forms from fourteen different worlds with almost no thought as to the interaction. Actually more than fourteen worlds were involved, if you want to count multiple transplants-animals brought from Earth to Newholme to Avalon to Wolfheim, and thence to Worlorn, that sort of thing.

"What Arkin and I are doing is a study of how things have worked out. We've been at it a couple years already, and there's enough work to keep us busy for a decade more. The results should be of particular interest to farmers on all the outworlds. They'll know which Fringe flora and fauna they can safely introduce to their homeworlds, and under what conditions, and which are poison to an ecosystem."

"The animals from Kimdiss are proving particularly poisonous," Janacek growled. "Much like the manipulators themselves."

Gwen grinned at him. "Garse is annoyed because it looks as though the black banshee is heading toward extinction," she told Dirk. "It's a shame, really. On High Kavalaan itself they've been hunted to the point where the species is clearly endangered, and it had been hoped that the specimens turned loose here twenty years ago would establish themselves and multiply, so they could be recaptured and taken back to High Kavalaan before the cold came. It hasn't worked out that way. The banshee is a fearful predator, but at home it can't compete with man, and on Worlorn it has had its niche appropriated by an infestation of tree-spooks from Kimdiss."

"Most Kavalars think of the banshee only as a plague and a menace," Jaan Vikary explained. "In its natural habitat it is a frequent man-killer, and the hunters of Braith and Redsteel and the Shanagate Holding think of banshee as the ultimate game, with a single exception. Ironjade has always been different. There is an ancient myth, of the time Kay Iron-Smith and his teyn Roland Wolf-Jade were fighting alone against an army of demons in the Lameraan Hills. Kay had fallen, and Roland, standing over him, was weakening by the moment, when from over the hills the banshees came, many of them flying together, black and thick enough to block out the sun. They fell hungrily onto the demon army and consumed them, one and all, leaving Kay and Roland alive. Later, when that teyn-and-teyn found their cave of women and established the first Ironjade holdfast, the banshee became their brother-beast and sigil. No Ironjade has ever killed a banshee, and legend says that whenever a man of Ironjade is in danger of his life, a banshee will appear to guide and protect him."

"A pretty story," Dirk said.

"It is more than a story," Janacek said. "There is a bond between Ironjade and banshee, t'Larien. Perhaps it is psionic, perhaps the things are sentient, perhaps it is all instinct. I do not pretend to know. Yet the bond exists."

"Superstition," Gwen said. "You really must not think too badly of Garse. It's not his fault that he never got much of an education."

Dirk spread paste across a biscuit and looked at Janacek. "Jaan mentioned that he was a historian, and I know what Gwen does," he said. "What about you? What do you do?"

The blue eyes stared coldly. Janacek said nothing.

"I get the impression," Dirk said, continuing, "that you are not an ecologist."

Gwen laughed.

"That impression is uncannily correct, t'Larien," Janacek said.

"What are you doing on Worlorn, then? For that matter"-he shifted his gaze to Jaan Vikary-"what does a historian find to do in a place like this?"

Vikary cradled his beer mug between two large hands and drank from it thoughtfully. "That is simple enough," he said. "I am a highbond Kavalar of the Ironjade Gathering, bonded to Gwen Delvano by jade-and-silver. My betheyn was sent to Worlorn by vote of the highbond council, so it is natural that I am here too, and my teyn. Do you understand?"

"I suppose. You keep Gwen company, then?"

Janacek appeared very hostile. "We protect Gwen," he said icily. "Usually from her own folly. She should not be here at all, yet she is, so we must be here as well. As to your earlier question, t'Larien, I am an Ironjade, teyn to Jaantony high-Ironjade. I can do anything that my holdfast might require of me: hunt or farm, duel, make highwar against our enemies, make babies in the bellies of our eyn-kethi. That is what I do. What I am you already know. I have told you my name."

Vikary glanced at him and bid him silent with a short chopping motion of his right hand. "Think of us as late tourists," he told Dirk. "We study and we wander, we drift through the forests and the dead cities, we amuse ourselves. We would cage banshees so they might be brought back to High Kavalaan, except that we have not been able to find any banshees." He rose, draining his mug as he did so. "The day ages and we sit," he said after he had set it back on the table. "If you would go off to the wild, you should do it soon. It will take time to cross the mountains, even by aircar, and it is not wise to stay out after dark."