Veritt now looked at Rimon in infinite sadness. "Is that where you learned to heal? Is it a gypsy trick, sorcery?"

"No," said Rimon, "I figured it out—just now. I wasn't even sure it would work—but what did he have to lose?" Rimon's mind felt sluggish. He didn't want to argue, yet he knew it was important for Veritt to understand.

"Mr. Veritt," said Kadi, "why are you so afraid of the gypsies? They're just people who wander around, keeping to themselves. I've never known them to hurt anyone."

"I was taught as a child that the gypsies still practice the Ancient sorcery that destroyed the world."

"You were also taught as a child," she said boldly, "that Simes don't have souls."

Veritt stared at her in shock for a moment—and then his face crinkled into one of his rare, warm smiles. "Kadi– may I call you Kadi?—I think you may have the power to convince Simes that down is up!' But you're right; we shouldn't condemn without knowledge."

The Sime woman spat. "A Gen philosophizin' and a Sime listenin' to 'er!"

"I couldn't have healed your friend without Kadi's help," Rimon said very quietly. "You saw what happened when I tried."

She paused, then said to Veritt, " 'S right! And that there gypsy feller, he had no Gen. What Rimon here did—must be different." She turned to Rimon. "Risko's one of my best men—been with me for years. I owe you for this."

Rimon began to protest, but she cut him off. "No, listen here. End of the month, you come by my place and pick out the best I got—not the free ones, the choice stock."

To her bewilderment, Rimon, Kadi, and Veritt all broke into laughter. Rimon finally caught his breath and said, "Thank you. I appreciate your offer, but—I don't kill."

"I know you won't kill that one—but nobody don't kill."

"Do you remember last spring, when you and Risko and some others laughed at Kadi and me for homesteading where we were? I didn't have anyone but Kadi with me then, and I haven't been to your Pens in all these months, have I? What did you think I was doing?"

"Never thought about it."

"Kadi supplies me with all the selyn I need. Every month."

The woman stared from Rimon to Kadi and back again. "Weir, I'll be shenned," she said. "That's why she ain't scared."

"Miss Slina," said Abel Veritt, "we should get Risko indoors where it's warm and dry so we can bandage that wound. Bring him to Fort Freedom for the night. You can take him back to town tomorrow."

Sara Fenell, who had been looking on for some time, said. "I have a Gen set aside that I won't be using. You can have him for Risko."

"Now that's more than friendly of you folks…"

"You. and the others from town, did a great service to Fort Freedom today. If it hadn't been for your warning, we wouldn't have been massed for the attack, and many more lives would have been lost."

Slina laughed. "Don't thank me for that—thank that crazy redheaded Gen."

Rimon started. "Kadi?" For the first time, he realized that the Wild Gens must have crossed the border near their homestead.

The Sime woman was saying, "She come ridin' through town, yellin' there was Wild Gens comin'. Never seen nothin' like it in my life, the way she stood up to a bunch of Simes. You'd a swore she was a leader of a border patrol, not a Gen!"

One of the gathered Simes added, "I thought she was runnin' for the border. When I tried to claim her, she swore at me like some Freeband Raider!"

Radiating embarrassment, Kadi murmured, "I rode off in such a hurry, I left my tags at home. But the storekeeper recognized me."

The storekeeper shrugged. "I knew she was legal, even if she is plumb crazy."

"That was a very brave thing to do," Veritt said.

"I wasn't brave. I was scared for Rimon, and all of you. I had to do it."

Slina was studying them. "I don't understand. You was all alone out there by the border, and you didn't just go on across? Why do you stay with this guy. who keeps you for selyn?"

Kadi smiled at her. "Why does any woman stay with her husband?"

"Husband!"

"Yes," said Rimon. He chose his words carefully, recalling the reaction of another Gendealer—his father. "Kadi and I have something special. So far, we haven't been able to teach it to anyone else, but that won't stop us from living together."

Slina shook her head again. "Weird. I got customers like to make it with Gens, sometimes. But I never heard of nobody wanting to marry one! That ain't legal, is it?"

"There's no law against it," Rimon pointed out.

"Clearly Rimon and Kadi are married in the eyes of God," said Abel Veritt.

Slina shrugged. "Your business. I guess if you have kids you'll be officially married, no matter what anybody says."

Kadi nodded serenely. "We'll have children. Rimon and I are. settled into our home now, we're making friends– life is good."

The Sime woman said, "I don't envy you. Folks don't like nobody who's too different. I guess you're better off around here than most places… but I sure wouldn't want to be in your place!"

After the battle, Rimon and Kadi stayed in Carlana's house, watching her children while she and Del went for a ride after dinner… and didn't return until dawn. Carlana blushingly apologized while Del tried to hide his smug satisfaction. Rimon knew that his kill in battle that day had been without remorse for the first time since Billy's death.

A few days later, Del and Carlana came out to help Rimon and Kadi. The four of them worked together for a while, but Kadi couldn't keep up with the Simes. She could drive the wagon, though, bringing it in for the others to load, then helping to unload.

At one point, as they finished loading the wagon, Carlana climbed onto the seat beside Kadi. "I'll do it this time," she told Del and Rimon.

Rimon, who had been riding to the threshing floor with Kadi each time, found himself stepping forward, as if to challenge the Sime woman's right—and then pulled himself back, embarrassed. Carlana was pre-turnover. Probably the two women just wanted to talk woman-talk. Kadi had little enough time for that.

At Rimon's hesitation, Del said with studied casualness, "All right, Ana. We'll have another load ready when you get back."

Rimon caught a peculiar glance from Del as he deliberately turned his back to the departing women and started working. After a few minutes, apparently convinced that Rimon was normal enough, Del said, "Rimon, I've decided I want Ana to be my wife."

"Hey! That's great!" said Rimon. "Married life is…" But Del was uncertain. "What's wrong?"

"I—I just don't know, Rimon. For the first time since Billy, I've found something to live for. But… she deserves better than I can give."

"Don't be silly," said Rimon. "Since you started that ranch, you're become the best catch this end of the Territory. You're young and strong and well on your way to getting rich—what more could a woman want?"

"For one thing, someone who shares her beliefs," said Del. "Her… relationship with God, the teachings of Fort Freedom—it's all so important to her, and most of it means nothing to me. I know that bothers her. And the one piece of knowledge we do share—that's what's tearing me up. Gens are people. She knows that as well as you and I do– except that to preserve her sanity, she accepts Abel Veritt's teaching that the ones grown in the Pens are just bodies without souls. If I could believe that—oh, God, if only I could believe it!"

Del stopped his savage hacking at the wheat and upended his scythe, staring at the wicked blade. "They almost convinced me."

"What?"

But Del, lost in reverie, didn't hear him. "This month, I had a good kill. I killed a man who was trying to kill Ana. Shen—that was the best kill I've ever had in my life! Real, alive, alert, undrugged—and no guilt, because he deserved to die. But the month before…"