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snowed several times during the years he lived in Basilica, but it was never more than an inch or two on the ground, and it always melted within a day. But the snow must never melt up there. What had Shedemei said? Mountains so new and high that it was a miracle the mantle of Earth could sustain the weight of them. Eleven thousand meters. The Oversold said that there were no mountains so high on Harmony, and as far as his records showed there had never been such high mountains on Earth before, either. These were new, pushed up by an ocean plate being subducted under what had once been a narrow isthmus connecting two continents. Now it was a great massif, the highest spot on Earth, and every climate and terrain existed on its perimeter. On the western coast the mountains were so high their rain shadow caused an utter desert. On the east, there was a place where rain fell almost continuously, day and night, summer and winter, so that it was bare rock, except for a few hardy mosses that could live with perpetual cloud cover.

Why can't Shedemei and I leave this village, simply explore this new planet? They don't need us. We don't want to be with them. Our son and daughter are grown up and married now. It would be nice to visit with them from time to time, but parenting they don't need. When they have children, I can sing them silly songs and dandle them on my knee. Twice a year.

But thinking of little children made him remember why they were there. Why they had spent tonight with no sleep, climbing a canyon in the dark. And now he looked out over the valley and saw that in the first light of dawn, the trees were jumping with life. Flying creatures bounding into the air, flying a short distance, and then dropping back down into the leaves. Each of them seemed to be carrying something in its feet as it flew.

"They're terrified of us," said Elemak softly.

"How can you tell that?" asked Mebbekew.

"Because they're evacuating their village. Look- those are their own children they're carrying."

"Look," said Zdorab. "When the children are a little larger, it takes two adults to carry them."

"Good eyes," said Elemak. "It took four of them to lift Zhivya. And if they think they can get away from me by carrying their children to-"

"They can" said Vas scornfully. "They can get away from us any time they want, precisely by carrying their children to safety. What are you going to do, dance along the treetops till you catch up with them?"

Elemak turned slowly. "Go back down the mountain, then, if you don't care about this errand."

Vas immediately apologized. "I'm tired, Elemak. I'm too tired to know what I'm saying."

"Then keep your mouth shut," said Elemak. "And your eyes open."

Zdorab sighed and turned away from this touching scene of true friendship. The only people who hated Elemak worse than his enemies were his friends. And yet they followed him, because they knew he needed them so much he couldn't ignore them, as Nafai certainly would have. That's probably how a lot of vile men get others to follow them, thought Zdorab. They can't get good men to follow them, and they need somebody, so they have to take the kind of men who can't find a good man interested in taking them on. The miracle was that evil persisted in the world, since the only people who took part in it generally couldn't stand each other, and for good reason.

Zdorab's attention was caught by a movement in a tree just down from the crest. A single bat-thing was sitting on a branch. "Look," said Zdorab.

"I see him," said Elemak.

"What's he doing?" asked Yasai.

"We all have the same number of eyes," said Elemak scornfully. "Watch and we'll see together."

The angel abruptly dropped from the tree, fluttering down to the ground in a small clearing that led up to where the humans stood. Zdorab got a chance to see it clearly then, its wings extended. The face was hideously ugly, but that was hardly a surprise. After all, it had descended from some wizen-snouted species of bat, hadn't it? The real surprise was the fascinating compromise that evolution had reached. Its arms and legs were almost mockingly thin. From wrist to ankle on each side of his body, the wings fanned out, held rigid by two distorted fingers of each hand. The