to speak to hen. Meanwhile, maybe AliIn could carry messages, if he could be talked into taking the risk. Gavving put it out of his mind. "I learned something today. The tree does move, and it's the carm, the flying box, that moves it. They've settled other trees-"

"What does that do for us?"

"I don't know yet."

Alfin moved away to his hammock.

Patience came hard to Gavving. In the beginning he had thought of nothing but escape. At night he could drive himself mad with worry over Minya. . . or he could sleep, and work, and wait, and learn.

The supervisors wouldn't answer questions. What did he know, what had he learned? The women farmed the treemouth and cooked; pregnant women lived elsewhere. Men tended machinery and wonked with wood, here in the upper reaches of the tuft. The copsiks talked of rescue, but never of revolt.

They wouldn't revolt now anyway, with the Holidays eight sleeps away. Afterward, maybe; but wouldn't the Navy know that from experience? They'd be ready. The supervisors were never without their truncheons, sticks of hardwood half a meter long. Horse said the women supervisors carried them too. During an insurrection the Navy might be given those instead of swords . . . or not.

What else? Bicycle works wore out. Damaging them-damaging anything made of starstuff-would hurt London Tree, but not soon. Here was where the elevators could be sabotaged, but the Navy could still put down a revolt by using the carm.

The carm did everything. It lived at the tree's midpoint, where the Scientist kept his laboratory. Was the Grad there? Was he planning something? He'd seemed determined to escape, even before they reached London Tree.

Was any of that worth anything? If we were together! We could plan something- He had learned that he might spend the rest of his life moving an

elevator on pumping water up the trunk. He had not had an allergy attack since his capture. It was not a bad life, and he was dangerously close to becoming used to it. In eight sleeps he would be allowed to see his own wife.

Carther States was setting fires halfway around the biggest flower in the universe.

Clave flapped his blanket at the coals. His arms were plunged elbowdeep in the foliage to anchor him. His toes clutched the edge of the blanket. He undulated his legs and torso to move the blanket in waves, exerting himself just enough to keep the coals red.

Eighty meters away, a huge silver petal gradually shifted position, turning to catch the sun at a sharper angle.

A fire would die in its own smoke, without a breeze, and breezes were rare in the jungle. The day was calm and bright. Clave took it as a chance to exercise his legs.