CHAPTER 1

WAVING GOOD-BYE TO their parents and friends, their beloved river and forests, to their home world, Petaybee, Murel and Ronan Shongili strapped themselves in for another launch into space.

So soon! It seemed they'd only arrived home and now it was time to go again.

It'll be great fun, sure it will, Ronan assured his twin sister in thought-talk. We'll see new places, meet new people, make new friends—

I'd have liked a bit more time with the old places and old friends nevertheless, Murel complained. But here we are again. It feels as if we never left. She looked around the lounge of the Piaf, a luxury liner much larger and more sophisticated than Kilcoole, the tiny village that was home. The lounge alone was as long as Kilcoole's main street and could have held eight of the village's largest building, the latchkay lodge, inside.

Except for that, Ronan said, with a meaningful nod at the one big difference in the lounge since their last trip.

Since they'd traveled from school back to Petaybee less than three short months before, the small saltwater tank had been replaced by an enormous one that dominated the lounge and dwarfed its occupants. Now the tank held a single Honu, the sentient sea turtle that was the sacred totem animal of their friend Ke-ola. The tank looked vast and empty despite the energetic game of tag between the Honu and Sky, the twins' river otter friend. On the return journey, if all went well, the tank would hold many more—and even larger—Honus traveling with their people to what would become their new Petaybean home.

During takeoff, the ship's owner, Marmion de Revers Algemeine, and Captain Johnny Green, its commander, remained on the bridge. Marmion's friendship had helped their family, their village, and their planet countless times over the years. The twins had known her all of their lives, and by now she knew their most important secret, as well as their father's. Many people on Kilcoole knew but very few outsiders. Johnny was not an outsider, since he'd been born on Petaybee. When the time had come for him to leave the Company Corps, he had chosen service with Marmie over life on Petaybee, but he was Petaybean all the same.

Ronan, Murel, and Ke-ola watched the liftoff from the lounge's viewport and the bank of screens that flanked it. Ke-ola was the reason for their current journey—and the reason Ronan and Murel were using thought-talk. They didn't want him to overhear their complaints and get the idea that they hadn't wanted to come.

The actual sight of Petaybee receding to a cold white and gray ball seemed no more real than its image on the screens. The cabin's pressure and gravity were so well maintained that the ship might have still been on the ground. They could not hear or smell or taste the passage, or feel it in the wind that was not there. They felt no sensation of lifting or moving.

The water in the tank didn't so much as slosh, but the Honu and Sky swam to the side to watch the departure. Then Sky tagged the Honu's shell and they began their game afresh.

The twins and Sky had become swimming friends before they were sent away to Marmie's space-station school. When they returned, Sky was waiting to help them find their missing father, even though Da had been lost at sea where river otters didn't ordinarily go. For their sake, the otter had even allowed himself to be transported in a helicopter, which was how he, as the first and only otter of any kind to inhabit Petaybee's skies, however briefly, had earned his name: Sky, the sky otter. Murel hoped that now that the little fellow was going into space he wouldn't want to change his name to Space. She'd just got used to calling him Sky.

As soon as the ship was free of Petaybee's gravity, the twins and Ke-ola unstrapped and raced to the tank to swim with the Honu and Sky. Ke-ola climbed the ladder to the top of the tank. The ladder had a staging platform on the top and was situated right beside the wide waterslide that ended in a shallow pool from which the water was recirculated into the tank. Sky and otter-kind in general loved to slide. Also, when it came time to remove the Honu from the pool, the slide would allow the tortoise to descend to the smaller pool without injury.

Murel clambered up the ladder behind Ke-ola and pulled off her clothes so that she wore only the harness holding the tiny bag containing her dry suit. A passing crew member would have seen a brief flash of white skin and dark hair before she dived into the water. Instantly she transformed into a silver-brown seal and streaked through the water after Ke-ola, Sky, and the Honu. A moment later they were joined by Ronan, also in seal form.

The water was saline to suit the Honu, but it didn't smell or taste quite right to the twins. No fish, for one thing. Still, it felt wonderful to be wet again. They dived, surfaced, splashed, tackled, were tackled, escaped, and dived again until Sky suddenly said, "River seals, look!"

He swam to the front of the tank where Marmie stood. She was saying something as she looked up toward the top of the tank.

Ke-ola, who had to go up for air more frequently than the others, was on the surface. He dived again, touched each of the twins, and pointed toward the top of the tank. Then with a pump of his arms and a thrust from his muscular brown legs, he shot upward.

Sky streaked past everyone and flung himself through the opening at the top of the tank that formed the lip of the waterslide. Hah! he cried. Otters first!

Ke-ola surfaced almost at once, followed by the twins. At the bottom of the slide they jumped onto the wet deck and shook themselves dry until they resumed human shape. A privacy screen installed beside the pool provided cover for them to pull their dry suit packets from the harnesses on their backs and pop into the suits before joining anyone else who happened to be in the lounge.

When they came out, Ke-ola and Marmie were sitting in bright cushioned chairs, sipping from tall drinks on the table between them. Sky sat on another chair, grooming his coat. A pot and four cups for tea sat on the table, along with a plate of chocolate biscuits. When Murel picked one up, she found it was just-baked warm.

Marmie smiled as they approached and took the other two chairs. "Ah, mes petits, I am sorry to interrupt your play, but we need to talk."

"Certainly, Marmie," Ronan said, sitting erect and using his best manners. Marmie had changed out of the white, fur-trimmed snowsuit she'd worn on Petaybee into a long skirt made of many colored patches of smooth and textured fabric that looked as soft as the coat of one of Clodagh's cats. With it she wore a long-sleeved turtleneck the color of the deepest part of the river on a sunny day. The fabric shimmered from midnight blue to steel gray with flashes of silver and cobalt. Around the high collar was a copper torc in the shape of a clamshell. Now and then Sky looked up from his preening to peer at the neckpiece.

Copyright © 2006 by Anne McCaffrey and Elizabeth Ann Scarborough.