“If you’re going to lecture me on the birds and the bees,” Ada said stiffly, “it’s a bit late.”

Harman laughed easily. Over the past couple of weeks, that laugh had enchanted Ada. Now it irritated the hell out of her.

“I don’t mean the sex, my dear,” he said. Ada noticed that it was the first time he’d used an endearment with her, but she was in no mood to appreciate it. “I mean when you receive permission to get pregnant, perhaps decades from now—and choose the sperm donor.”

Ada was blushing and the fact that she couldn’t stop blushing made her angry. She blushed more deeply. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

She did, of course. It was men who weren’t supposed to know or discuss such things. Most women decided to apply for pregnancy around their Third Twenty. Usually the waiting period was one to two years before permission was granted—relayed from the post-humans through servitors. At that point, the woman would cease sexual intercourse, take the prescribed pregnancy uninhibitor, and decide which of her former mates would be the sperm-father of her child. Pregnancy ensued within days and the rest was as ancient as . . . well, humankind.

“I’m talking about the mechanism by which you decide which stored sperm-packet is chosen by your body,” continued Harman. “The real old-style human females didn’t have that choice . . .”

“Nonsense,” snapped Ada. “We are the old-styles. It’s always been this way.”

Harman shook his head slowly, almost sadly. “No,” he said. “Even in Savi’s day, just fourteen hundred years ago, pregnancy was more of a slapdash thing. She says that this sperm-storage and selection mechanism was something the posts built into us—into women—based on some borrowed genetic structure from moths.”

“Moths!” said Ada, no longer simply shocked but truly, deeply angry now. This was as absurd as it was demeaning. “What the hell are you talking about, Harman Uhr?”

His head snapped up and he seemed to notice her reaction for the first time, as if her retreat to the formal honorific had been a slap in the face bringing him back to reality.

“It’s true,” he said. “I’m sorry if I upset you, but Savi says that the posts genetically structured this ability to choose father-sperm years after intercourse from the genes of a moth species named . . .”

“Enough!” shouted Ada. Her hands were balled into fists. She’d never struck anyone in her life, or wanted to, but at this moment she was close to swinging at Harman. “Savi says this, Savi says that. I’ve had enough of that old bitch. I don’t even believe she is that old . . . or wise. She’s just crazy. I’m going back to the sonie.” She walked off into the woods.

“Ada!” called Harman.

She ignored him, walking uphill, slipping on needles and wet humus.

“Ada!”

She strode on, ready to leave him behind.

“Ada, that’s the wrong direction.”

Hannah had caught up with Odysseus a few hundred yards from the glade. He whirled and put his hand on the hilt of his sword when he heard her crashing through the brush, but relaxed when he saw who it was.

“What do you want, girl?”

“I want to see your sword,” said Hannah, brushing her dark hair back from her face.

Odysseus laughed. “Why not?” He unclipped the leather sheath from his belt and handed over the weapon. “Be careful with the edges, girl. I could shave with this blade, if I ever chose to shave.”

Hannah drew the short sword and hefted it tentatively.

“Savi tells me that you work with metals,” said Odysseus. He bent to a stream, cupped his hand, sipped. “She says that you may be the only person, male or female, in all this brave new world, who knows how to forge bronze.”

Hannah shrugged. “My mother remembered old tales about forging metal. She played with fire and open hearths when she was younger. I continue the experiments.” She swung the sword overhand, chopping down.

“You’ve seen us fight in your turin cloth,” said Odysseus.

Hannah nodded. “So?”

“You’re using the sword properly, girl. Hacking rather than stabbing. This tool is made for severing limbs and spilling guts, nothing more refined.”

Hannah grimaced and handed the weapon back. “Is this the sword you used on the plains of Ilium?” she asked softly. “And in your adventure to steal the Pallodian?”

“No.” He lifted the blade vertically until some of the light spilling down between the high branches danced on its surface. “This particular sword was a gift to me, from . . . a female . . . during my travels.”

Hannah waited for more explanation, but instead of telling another story, Odysseus said, “Would you like to see what makes this sword different?”

Hannah nodded.

Odysseus used his thumb to tap at the hilt guard twice, and suddenly the sword seemed to shimmer slightly. Hannah leaned closer. Yes, there was a subtle but persistent hum coming from the blade. She lifted one hand toward the metal but Odysseus’ hand shot out quickly, grabbing her wrist.

“If you touched it now, girl, you’d lose all your fingers.”

“Why?” She didn’t struggle to pull her wrist away, and after a few seconds Odysseus released it.

“It’s vibrating,” said Odysseus, holding the sword blade flat just below eye level. Hannah noticed again that she was exactly the same height as Odysseus. The night before, she had heard him in the green bubble hall on the bridge after the others had turned in, joined him for a walk, returned to his domi to talk for hours, and had gone to sleep on the floor next to his cot. Hannah knew that Ada thought they’d become lovers; she didn’t mind and couldn’t think of a reason to disabuse her friend of the notion.

“It’s almost as if it’s singing,” said Hannah, turning slightly better to hear the high-pitched hum.

Odysseus laughed loudly at this, although Hannah didn’t know why. “Don’t worry,” he said. “It wasn’t tossed to me by some Lady of the Lake, although that’s not too far from the truth of it.” He laughed again.

Hannah looked at the bearded man. She had no clue as to what he was talking about. She wondered if he did. “Why does it vibrate?” she asked.

“Stand back,” said the barrel-chested man.

Most of the sequoia around them were six to ten feet thick, some thicker, but a smaller pine—perhaps a ponderosa or Douglas fir—was growing in a sunny patch a few yards to their left. The tree was probably thirty or forty years old, about fifty feet tall, with a trunk perhaps eighteen inches thick.

Odysseus planted his feet, gripped the sword in one hand, and swung idly at the trunk in an effortless backhand stroke.

The blade moved so smoothly through its arc that it appeared that he’d missed completely. There was no noise of impact. A few seconds later, the tall pine tree shivered, shifted, and fell noisily to the ground.

Odysseus thumbed the hilt again and the faint vibration hum ceased.

Hannah stepped closer to inspect the chest-high stump and the fallen tree. The trunk sections looked as if they had been surgically separated, not sawed. She laid her palm on the top of the severed stump. There was no sap, no shavings. The wood was so smooth it felt as if it had been sealed in plastic, cauterized somehow. She turned back to Odysseus.

“That must have come in handy during the siege of Troy,” she said.

“You weren’t listening, girl,” said Odysseus. He slipped the weapon back in its sheath and strung it to his broad belt. “This was a gift some years after I’d left the war and begun my travels. If I’d had this at Ilium . . .” Odysseus grinned horribly. “There wouldn’t be a Trojan, god, or goddess left with a head on his or her shoulders, girl. I promise you that.”

Hannah found herself grinning back at the old man. They weren’t lovers—not yet—but Hannah was planning to stay at Ardis Hall while Odysseus was visiting there, and who knew what might happen?