A guard half-saluted, politely. "Baron Bharaputra's compliments, ma'am, sir, and would you prepare to join him and the Baronne for dinner. We will escort you upstairs when you're ready."

*    *    *

The Bharaputras' dining room had large glass doors giving a view onto an enclosed, winter-frosted garden, and a big guard by every exit. The garden glimmered in the gathering gloom; they had been here a full Jacksonian day, then, twenty-six hours and some odd minutes. Vasa Luigi rose at their entry, and at his gesture the guards faded back to positions outside the doors, giving an illusion of privacy.

The dining room was arranged stylishly, with individual couches and little tables set in a tiered semicircle around the view of the garden. A very familiar-looking woman sat on one of the couches.

Her hair was white streaked with black, and wound up in elaborate braids around her head. Dark eyes, thin ivory skin softening with tiny wrinkles, a high-bridged nose—Dr. Durona. Again. She was dressed in a fine flowing silk shirt in a pale green perhaps accidentally reminiscent of the color of the Durona lab coats, and soft trousers the color of cream. Dr. Lotus Durona, Baronne Bharaputra, had elegant tastes. And the means to indulge them.

"Rowan, dear." She held out a hand as if Rowan might give it a courtier's kiss.

"Lotus," said Rowan flatly, and compressed her lips. Lotus smiled and turned her hand over, converting it into an invitation to sit, which they all did.

Lotus touched a control pad at her place. A girl wearing Bharaputra brown-and-pink silks entered and served drinks, to the Baron first, curtseying with lowered eyes before him. A very familiar-looking girl, tall and willowy, with a high-bridged nose, fine straight black hair bound at her nape and flowing in a horse-tail down her back. . . . When she made her offering to the Baronne, her eyes flicked up, opening like flowers to the sun, bright with joy. When she bowed before Rowan, her up-turning gaze grew startled, and her dark brows drew down in puzzlement. Rowan gazed back equally startled, a look that changed to dawning horror as the girl turned away.

When she bowed before him, her frown deepened. "You . . . !" she whispered, as if amazed.

"Run along, Lilly dear, don't gawk," said the Baronne kindly.

As she left the room, with a swaying walk, she glanced covertly back over her shoulder at them.

"Lilly?" Rowan choked. "You named her Lilly?"

"A small revenge."

Rowan's hands clenched in deep offense. "How can you? Knowing what you are? Knowing what we are?"

"How can you choose death over life?" The Baronne shrugged. "Or worse—let Lilly choose it for you? Your time of temptation is not yet, Rowan my dear sister. Ask yourself again in twenty or thirty years, when you can feel your body rotting around you, and see if the answer comes so easily then."

"Lilly loved you as a daughter."