One day, at last, he stood at the viewport, watching Procyon Alpha

nearing. A year ago, frightened, terribly alone, still unsteady on his

new Lhari muscles and terrified by the monsters that were his shipmates,

he had watched these planets spinning away. Poor old Rugel, poor old

Baldy!

Behind him, Meta came into the lounge.

"Bart--"

He turned to face her. "It won't be much longer, Meta. Tomorrow I'll

find out what the Federation is going to do to me. Conspiracy

unlawfully to board--and all the rest of it. Even if I don't go to a

prison planet, I'll spend the rest of my life chained down to Vega."

"It doesn't have to be that way."

"What other choice is there?" he demanded.

"You're half Mentorian," she said, raising her eager face. "Oh, Bart,

you love it so, you know you can't bear to give it up. Stay with

us--please stay!"

Before answering, he looked out the viewport a last time. The clouds of

cosmic dust swirled and foamed around the familiar jewels of his own

sky. Blue, beloved Vega, burning in the heart of the Lyre--home--when

would he go home? He had no home now. Yet his father had left him Vega

Interplanet, as well as Eight Colors and a quest to the stars.

He searched for the topaz of Sol, where he had learned astrogation;

Procyon, where he had become a Lhari; the ruby of Aldebaran (hail and

farewell, David Briscoe!); the bloodstone of Antares, where he had

learned fear and the shape of integrity. The colors, the unknowable

colors of space. And others. Nameless stars where he and his Lhari

shipmates had worked and played. And stars he had never seen and would

never see, all the endless worlds beyond worlds and stars beyond

stars....

He took a last, longing look at the colors of space, then turned his

back on them, deliberately giving them up. He could not pay the price

the Mentorians paid.

"No, Meta," he said huskily. "The Mentorian way is one way, but--I've

had a taste of being one of the masters of space. It's more than most

men ever have, maybe it's more than I deserve. But I can't settle for

anything less. Not even if it means losing you."

He shut his eyes and stood, head bowed. When he looked up again, he was

alone with the stars beyond the viewport, and the lounge was empty.




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