Rety felt a thrill each time someone briefly met her gaze and quickly looked away.

I’m not one of you. Never was. And now you know it too.

Only Binni showed no trace of being overwhelmed by the deity Rety had become. The same old disdain and disappointment lay in those metal-gray eyes. At age twenty-eight, Binni was younger than any of the foray-ers, even Ling. Still, it seemed nothing on Jijo, or in heaven, would ever surprise her.

It had been years since Rety last called the old woman “Mama.” She wasn’t tempted to resume now.

With her back straight, she walked past the chefs and their grisly work. Inside, though, she wavered.

Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to come back here. Why mix with these ghosts when she could be in the aircraft, relishing victory over her lifelong enemy? The punishment being executed on Jass seemed rightful and good, now that she didn’t have to face his agony up close. That contradiction made Rety nervous, as if something were missing. Like trying to use moccasins without laces.

“wife! there you are, wife! bad wife, to leave yee alone so long!”

Several clansmen scurried out of the way, making room for a four-legged creature, galloping past their ankles like some untouchable, all-powerful being. Which the little urrish male was, in a sense, since Rety had loudly promised horrors to anyone laying a hand on her “husband.”

yee leaped into her arms, squirming with pleasure even as he scolded.

“wife leave yee alone too long with female foes! they offer yee soft, warm pouch, temptresses!”

Rety flared jealousy. “Who offered you a pouch! If any of those hussies—”

Then she saw he was teasing. Some of the tension in her shoulders let go as she laughed. The little critter was definitely good for her.

“relax, wife,” he assured her. “just one pouch for yee. go in now?”

“In now,” she replied, unzipping the plush hip bag Ling had provided, yee dove inside, wriggled around, then stuck out his head and long neck to peer at her.

“come now, wife, visit Ul-Tahni. that sage ready talk now.”

“Ah, is she? Well now, isn’t that awfully nice of her.”

Rety didn’t relish going to see the leader of the out-landers. But Kunn had given her a job, and now was as good a time as any.

“All right,” she said. “Let’s hear what the hinney has to say.”

The urs, it appeared, had done the small human expedition a favor. In receiving death and devastation, they had left a warning.

A tale of callous murder was clear to read through the dawn light — in seared and shattered trees, blackened craters, and scattered debris, pushed by a gusty, dry wind. The violence that took place here — just a few days ago by Dwer’s estimate — must have been brief but horrible.

The plateau’s terraced outlines were still visible after ages of softening by erosion and vegetation. It was a former Buyur site, going back to the last race licensed to use this world — legal residents dwelling in heavenlike towers, who went through their daily lives unafraid of the open sky.

Dwer traced the terror that recently fell upon this place. All too vividly he pictured the panicked urrish settlers, rearing and coughing with dread, coiling their long necks, with slim arms crossed to shield their precious pouches as the ground around them exploded. He could almost hear their screams as they fled the burning encampment, down a steep trail leading into a narrow defile — where human footprints swarmed in abruptly from both sides, tracked by crude moccasins, mingling with urrish hooves chaotically.

He picked up shreds of home-twisted twine and leather cord. From countless signs, Dwer pictured ropes and nets falling to trap the urs, taking them prisoner.

Couldn’t they tell they were being herded? The aircraft aimed off to the sides and all around, to drive them. So why didn’t the urs scatter instead of clumping in a mass to he caught?

Several patches of sticky sand gave him an answer. The overall intent might have been capture, but the flying gunner had few qualms about enforcing the round-up with a corpse or two.

Don’t judge the urs too harshly. Do you know how you’ll react when lightning bolts start falling all around? War is messy, and we’re all out of practice. Even Drake never had to cope with anything like this.

“So, we’re facing an alliance between the human sooners and the aliens,” Lena concluded. “Kind of changes things, don’t it?”

Danel Ozawa wore a bleak expression. “This entire region is compromised. Whatever fate befalls the Slope will now surely happen here, as well. Whether by plague, or by fire, or hunting their victims one at a time with machines — they’ll scourge the area as thoroughly as back home.”

Danel’s task had been to carry a legacy into the wilderness — both knowledge and fresh genes to invigorate the human tribe already living here — to preserve something of Earthling life in case the worst came to pass. It was never a joyous enterprise, more like the mission of a lifeboat captain in some ancient tale about a shipwreck. But at least that endeavor had been based on a slim hope. Now his eyes lacked all trace of that emotion.

Jenin protested, “Well, didn’t you just say the sooners and aliens were allies against the urs? The star-gods wouldn’t turn on the tribe now, would they?”

She stopped as the others looked at her, their expressions answering better than words.

Jenin paled. “Oh.”

Moments later, she lifted her chin once more.

“Well, they still don’t know we exist, right? So why don’t we just leave, right now? The four of us. What about north, Dwer? You’ve been up that way before. Let’s go!”

Danel kicked some debris left by the urs’ riotous flight and the looting that followed. He pointed to a narrow cleft in the rocks. “We can build a pyre over there.”

“What are you doing?” Jenin asked, as Dwer led the donkeys where the sage indicated and began unloading their packs.

“I’ll set the grenades,” Lena said, prying open a container. “We’d best add some wood. I’ll gather these broken crates.”

“Hey! I asked you guys — what’s going on?”

Danel took Jenin’s arm while Dwer hauled a portion of their supplies to one side — food and clothing plus a few basic implements, none containing any metal. Left behind in a stack were all the books and sophisticated tools they had taken from the Slope.

The sage explained.

“We brought this legacy in order to maintain some minimal semblance of human culture in exile. But four people can’t establish a civilization, no matter how many books they have. We must prepare for the likelihood that all of this must be destroyed.”

Clearly the prospect gnawed at Ozawa. His face, already haggard, now seemed sliced by pain. Dwer averted his gaze, concentrating on the work at hand, separating only supplies helpful to a small party of fugitives on the run.

Jenin chewed on the news and nodded. “Well, if we must live and raise families without books, I guess that just puts us ahead of schedule, no? A bit farther along the Path of—”

She stopped. Danel was shaking his head.

“No, Jenin. That is not the way things will be.

“Oh, we four might as well try to survive. But even if we did make it to some far-off valley, beyond reach of whatever demise the aliens have planned, it’s unlikely we’d adapt to a strange ecosystem in time. Rety told us that her band lost half its first generation to accidents and allergic reactions. That’s typical for sooner groups, till they learn what’s safe to eat or touch. It’s a deadly, trial-and-error process. Four just isn’t enough.”

“I thought—”

“And that leaves out the problem of inbreeding—”

“You can’t mean—”

“But even if we could solve all of those dilemmas, it still wouldn’t work, because we aren’t going to start a band of fallen savages, spiraling into ignorance, even if the scrolls give that fate all sorts of fancy names. Human beings never came to Jijo for the Path of Redemption.”