t. «You are Rack the Healer, madman,» Red Earth sent angrily, adding astonishment and shock that Rack was once again recklessly using the life substance of a Power Giver for illegal soaring. «I ask only a hearing,» Rack sent, «a fair and impartial forum composed of equal numbers of Far Seers, Power Givers, and Healers.» «The law,» Red Earth sent, «is the law. Your new and startling thing has been adjudged, after careful study, to be the result of unexplained forces in the depths of space.» «The Far Seers err and dream dreams of the unimaginative mind,» Rack sent, himself becoming a bit angry, «for the object is clearly crafted and must, therefore, be the work of the Old Ones. As such, it not only should receive the attentions of the scholars among the Far Seers, but should be subjected to the speculations of the scientific Healers, as well.» «It is the will of nature that the Far Seers hand down the law,» Red Earth said. «Tell me, Healer, your justification for continued defiance.» «In the interest of the race,» Rack said. «In that interest I have traveled far. In that interest I risked death and disgrace, and in return I am scorned and judged without a hearing.» «Your absence from the hearing was your own doing,» Red Earth said pointedly, referring to Rack's flight from justice. «If the Old Ones were capable of crafting so unique a material,» Rack went on stubbornly, «what else might they have been capable of? I demand a renewed effort to rethink our position.» «You seek to dig in the earth and release death,» Red Earth said sadly, seeing behind Rack's words a picture of the valley of hot waters. «This we will not allow. I have been empowered, to my sorrow, to—» But Rack was prepared. As the Far Seer gathered his energies, Beautiful Wings sent them soaring high into the purpling sky, into the regions of nonair, into the coldness of the upper reaches. The bolt from Red Earth's mind dulled Rack's senses momentarily. Shocked, he realized that it had been meant to be a killing blow. Had he not anticipated it and removed himself from Red Earth's range, he would have been a lifeless form clinging inside Beautiful Wings' field of power, draining her, leaving her without his healing protection. «So be it,» he said. Flesh to flesh, they accelerated, leaving the zone of the sun for the darkness to the east. They sensed the rolling sea beneath them as they sought the land of the east, fleeing those who would kill. VII I, Rack the Healer, sing of my joy with the brilliant satellite in opposition to the sun, rising there in the cold, airless heights, dark valleys forming shadows on its face. I can reach out and touch its face, not with my mind, as the Far Seers do, but with my imagination, as dreamers do. I dream and my dreams are turning true; welded to my flesh is Beautiful Wings, whose body, even in flight, nourishes that which we have made together. I share with her the elation of freedom from the pull of the planet. Through her mind I see the delicate design of the magnetic field, and with my own force coupled with hers, for we are one, I push against it. We use its power with our own, directing the force to send the union of our bodies flying. The bright gleaming satellite comes swimming through space to meet us; the clouds roil darkly beneath us; the planet turns in its circle around the sun. I feel myself giving, my surplus of substance being used for the first time in Power Giver soaring. I wonder at it. I speak with her, telling her of the satisfaction I have known in my wanderings and she shares with me that curiosity which, to my knowledge, has in the past been limited to those of my kind. We are not dismayed by the length of the passage; we are occupied in spying out the far, bright spots the Far Seers tell us are other suns like ours. Although their senses are too dim to affirm it, the basic laws of nature must work even there. Planets swim in their orbit and nature peoples the planets with life, for life is the be all end all. I hail you, all you far-flung Power Givers and Healers and all your loves. May your unions produce a balance. May all of you who live where the far suns glitter dimly find your tints to be brilliant and your blendings all-powerful. For I know the goodness of life and share your joy as I invite you to share mine. My mind makes flamboyant pictures of hope. I see the survival factor rising and the Breathers reproducing themselves in numbers as difficult for my small mind to hold as is the picture of the distance between us and that bright circle of light that rises overhead. The sun is shrinking but still gives our world above the clouds a softness of light that illuminates the lightly-filmed eyes of my beloved. Her lips work in a smile under mine and our flesh tugs at itself where it is blended together. I see understanding. I see love. I see the race rising to overcome the hardships of our ancient home, replenishing the air, stilling the storms, banishing the toxicity to the sink holes, leaving the earth to us. I see the need for our self-protective isolation in establishments overcome, and even the fragile Keepers basking in the kind sun. I see the Far Seers free to make more than an occasional brief foray into our unchallenged outside and using their analytical minds to conquer our problems. For too long have we allowed the planet and its deadly poisons to dominate us. Are we at the mercy of the planet? No. If we merely took what was offered, we would die gasping in the clouds of death. The learned thinkers tell us that we are beloved of nature, and yet she does her best, in every way, at every moment of the sun circle, to kill us. Nature is the sacred force and is, therefore, not to be questioned. Tampering not allowed. Witness my own problems involving an ancient law that says thou shalt not dig in the softness or the hardness of the earth lest the poisons of death overtake you. But I, Rack the Healer, have wetted my hands in the products of the soft earth, pushing my fingers into the muck of a new stream bed with impunity. You, out there, circling the far suns, are you bound by tradition? Are your Far Seers blind to new knowledge? We could, with our strength, soar to meet that bright, dark-shadowed planet, our satellite, and speak to the men there. I see it and think, ah, how clear, how bright. How clean the air. Is it not as old, not as wasted, not as soiled as our world? I think not, for otherwise it would glow with the poisonous yellows and purples rather than with the clarity of the hot water that gushes from the rocks in the valley I found beyond the river. Yes, we are strong, full of substance. Yet as we soar I feel the cold seep through my scales and slow my blood. My love shivers against me and we drop to the clouds to warm ourselves with the heat of the sun captured under that thick blanket. Here is the reality that binds us within our scales and within our minds. There I doubt, for we live on my stored air, our gills expelling the gases without allowing a breath to pass. Here our outer lids close and we are in darkness, for the tender membranes of our inner lids are scalded by the harshness of the atmosphere. Here, the bright sky hidden, we soar on instinct alone, guided by the Healer's sense of direction and by the Power Giver's ability to measure distances. Farther down, on the surface, skimming slowly, we find pockets of breathable air and I replenish my stores, but the storms that are abating in our homeland behind us rage still on the sea and the heavy waters heave up, wetting our feet. Here nature is cruel—a blasphemous thought, but true. Outside the protective community of my birth, I, Rack the Healer, outlaw, think such thoughts and have to hide them, for my love is not as cynical as I. The water of the sea is warm and I remember the feel of it on my scales when I would dive for the slime source. Rocks at my waist, for without weight I would float, I sink to the bottom and feel the slick, pulpy plants in my fingers as I gather the food source. It is said that the people of the eastern lands eat the flesh of the small, armored animals that crawl in the beds of the slime source. The Far Seers have said they are poisonous. Does this not speak of the fallibility of the law-givers? I have not seen it, but it is recorded. The same sea washes both the shores of my homeland and the eastern lands; would the small, armored animals who live in it be poison for some and food for others? I know only that there is much to learn and I, Rack the Healer, intend to stretch my mind until I feel it strain within its scales. For I have known the joy of union. Unique among Healers, I have known the joy of joining my body totally with a Power Giver, her blood my blood, her organs open to my healing powers. True, I may be suffering from excess pride, but can such a one as I think seriously about resigning himself to tradition, when such small innovations open such broad vistas of possibility? We hunger. We suck the good broth from my pack and it refreshes us. My cells engorge themselves and I feel my strength flowing through my welded tongue into her body. To please me, she allows us to drop from fearful heights, like stones dropped from the escarpment, falling, falling, until, with a long, sweeping rise, we soar again. We laugh and sweep through the dawning sky as the rising sun brightens the low clouds and sends its glow to greet us. There is a world around us. We are not totally free, for we are dependent on the broth. For the broth, we are dependent on the Far Seers who have tamed the many-legged Webber, who have bred the deadly Juicers and who combine the sticky material exuded by the Webbers with the fiery fluid of the Juicers to form vats of the Material to hold the broth. We are not independent, for nature has decreed that it takes the three mobile forms to provide food and shelter for the race— Far Seers, Healers, and Power Givers, working together. The particular mental talents of the Far Seers mold the Material and start the process of breakdown in the pulpy slime-source plants gathered by the Healers. That results, with the addition of power from the Power Givers, in our food. Thus, we are all dependent on each other. My love and I must become a part of a community in the eastern lands which, the senses of Beautiful Wings tell us, are lying ahead where the clouds billow high. But we will have free times. Then we will fly, our packs with us, to see the unseen lands, to explore the vast, empty spaces, to walk the barren rocks of the earth. For we have the freedom of unlimited flight. We have now traveled far and I am scarcely hurt; my resources are almost totally intact. With my metabolism and her ability to climb the lines of force radiated from the planet we could truly soar off this dying planet and seek our brothers on the far worlds. Ah, you see, I am Rack the Healer, dreamer. VIII Weathered Mountain the Far Seer, making a routine check of his area, noted the soaring Power Giver carrying a healthy young Healer with an almost empty pack with resignation. He was old. Named for his area, that ancient, eroded range against which the sea rolled on the west, he had lived too many sun circles to be amazed by this willful waste of the Power Giver's substance. The line of flight traced back to the sea indicating that this was a joy flight, for no one on a purposeful mission would be traveling that route in his place. Weathered Mountain was more concerned with the fact that the new beginning was not bringing the expected rise in the survival factor. He was engaged in measuring the output of the food and Material establishment in his area and was becoming convinced that short rations were in the offing, since the outside conditions did not allow the Healers a full day's work in the sea. This conclusion made him grumpy, for he, of course, would be on as short rations as anyone, and at his age such minor discomforts displeased him. He paid no more attention to the soaring Power Giver and her burden until his senses, swinging out automatically, noted that they were lowering into his area. He checked identity idly. The answer he received caused him to arise quickly, moving with a spring in his legs that he had thought was long since gone. What he had seen pushed survival factors and food production problems into the back of his old mind and filled him with a youthful excitement. «Welcome, welcome, welcome,» he sent. «Welcome to my area and welcome to my air and my broth and my meat.» Rack sent thanks and said privately, «This place is as good as any.» Beautiful Wings agreed, although she was a bit awed by the high-piled rocky bones of the ancient mountain range. The life forms, they found, were the same their world over. Weathered Mountain the Far Seer was no different from his counterparts in their homeland. And the establishment, with one noticeable difference, was much the same. The difference—a display of gleaming nuggets of hard material in a case of the Material—caught Rack's eye and interest. «We do, indeed, come from across the sea,» he answered to Weathered Mountain's query. «Then your Power Giver must have rest,» the Far Seer said solicitously, knowing the terrible drain of substance involved in the long journey. «There is a vacant chamber, my prime Keeper having unfortunately died during the winter.» «Beautiful Wings is young and strong,» Rack said, «and relatively unharmed. She prefers to stay with me.» «As you wish,» Weathered Mountain said, seating himself. The excitement he felt had begun to make his old limbs tremble. «Have you then developed new techniques for soaring?» Rack pondered the question. In this strange land, where people were said to eat the flesh of sea animals, he was at a disadvantage. He was not yet ready to reveal the amazing thing that had happened between him and Beautiful Wings. «Only a long period of rest and heavy feeding and breathing in advance,» he said. «And, as I said, she is unusually strong for a Power Giver.» Weathered Mountain was not content with the answer, but there were larger questions. In his lifetime no one had crossed the sea. The last crossing, made in the time of his grandfather, had been undertaken in order to compare survival factors and air readings on either side of the sea. This comparison had indicated that conditions were much the same on both sides of the wide waters and that the same deadly air moved over all lands. «The purpose of your trip, then,» he sent politely, «if you are prepared to discuss it with such a one?» «We are honored, indeed, to be greeted by one of such accumulated wisdom,» Rack said, «for I detect the presence of a double picture of the mind of a Keeper.» «It is true that I pride myself on my interest in learning,» said Weathered Mountain, «but you flatter me.» He smiled. «The new Keeper is young and has been newly filled with the knowledge formerly kept in the mind of the old one who died. I did note, however during the process of transferral, that we have the complete records of the last visit from across the sea, if you are interested.» «In time, perhaps,» Rack said, raising the Far Seer's curiosity to a feverish level. «But we did not come to gather observations of survival factors and air readings. We came to confront you with a new piece of information—at least, information that is new to our land. It is our wish to see if any information of a comparable nature is available in the lands of the east.» Beautiful Wings cast a look at him, for he had not discussed his plans with her. She, with the noninventive mind of a Power Giver, had envisioned Rack applying for a position in the area of the Far Seer for both of them. «Ah,» sent Weathered Mountain in expectancy. «Perhaps it would be best for you to enter—» Rack said, as he opened a specific area of his mind. «If you permit.» «Gladly.» Rack felt the mind tendrils of the Far Seer. The memory of the feel, the weight, the texture, and the taint of wet, soft earth, was there as the Far Seer examined Rack's stored impressions of the odd material from the valley of the hot waters. Rack waited, slightly nervous. A bit of his fear must have leaked, for the old Far Seer sent amusement. «Your law-givers still abide by that hoary old taboo?» Rack felt relief. «I am pleased to find that the wise Far Seers of the east value knowledge above tradition.» «You see them,» Weathered Mountain said, indicating his collection of hard-material nuggets. «I think there is a connection between the hard materials and the Old Ones,» Rack said. «Do you find that foolish?» The Far Seer shrugged. «One does not fully understand. I would that you had brought the new thing,» he added. «Its value, of course, prevented that.» «Yes.» Then the Far See