"Four of the Serjents recovered. One of the girls, Karilly, looks okay but she doesn't talk."

"Shock. She may recover. When may I see them?" "Kendy, I wanted to give Mishael a tour of the CARM.

The Chairman vetoed that. He's afraid they'll try to steal the CARM."

"Nonsense. What do the rest of your tribe think?"

"We're split down the middle. Half of us want to go see what's in the Clump. They've got a place ... the Market? . . . where we could get anything we want. The Serjents told us about it."

"And?"

"The Chairman is scared spitless of the Clump. He thinks we're too close now. Some of the others feel the same way. Jayan and Jinny, of course, but Mark and Minya too. Even the Serjents don't all want to leave. Mark's asked Ryllin for permission to marry Karilly, and she gave it."

"Good. How do you feel about this, Jeffer?" "1 want to see the Clump. Booce told me they've got something they call the Library, but it sounds like a CARM autopilot. I want to scan their cassettes. Kendy, I'm doing what I can. I just took some of them flying. They like that. Maybe they'll start wondering what else they're missing."

"I remember Clave. He leads his citizens where they want to go. Call a council. Force your citizens to make a decision."

"What good does that do us?"

"If you lose the vote, you'll know where you stand.

Then make Clave set a date for moving the tree. Decide what you need and who you need. Is there any chance you can talk Mark around?"

"None."

"The Serjents told you how to go about setting up a logging enterprise. Tell me."

The children slept on, exhausted by their flying. Gavving was making an early breakfast on a slice of smoked dumbo meat. He said, "The Admiralty has earthlife plants."

"We've lived without them for fourteen years," Minya said sleepily.

"We lived without lifts and the CARM for longer than that. It was because we didn't know."

"The Admiralty has never touched us. We wouldn't know it exists, except that Booce tells us so. But you want to know more. Aren't these matters more properly discussed in council?"

Gavving looked closely at his wife. "You looked like this fourteen years ago, when you were trying to kill me. The whole tuft is like that. There hasn't been fighting like this since the War of London Tree!"

"I haven't forgotten London Tree. We made a home here. Any change is for the worse."

"Dear, are you sorry they came?"

"No!" Minya said with some force. She was fully awake now. "There aren't enough of us. We all feel that."

"Lawri the Scientist talks about the gene pool being too small-"

"We don't need that gibberish. We can feel we're too few. Now we have three more women, even if Ryllin is too old to host a guest, and they're different from us-"

"They are indeed!"