"Your father's at Planys," she said. "They say you visit him." He nodded. A lump got into his throat. God. He was not going to break down and go maudlin in front of a fifteen-year-old. "You miss him."

Second nod. She could feel her way to all the buttons. She wasEmory. She had proved it in Novgorod, and the whole damn government had rocked on its pinnings.

"Are you mad at me about it?" she asked.

He shook his head.

"Aren't you going to talk to me?"

Damn. Pull it together, fool!

"Are you mad at my uncles?"

He shook his head again. There was nothingsafe to say. Nothing safe to do. She was the one who needed to know. He knew everything. And if there was a way out for Jordan it was going to be in her administration—someday. If there was any hope at all.

She was silent a long time. Just waiting for him. Knowing, surely, that he was fracturing. Himself, who was thirty-four years old; and not doing well at all.

He leaned forward, elbows on knees, studied the dust between his feet, then looked up at her.

No knowledge at all of what the first Ari had done to him. Denys swore to that. And swore what he would do if he opened his mouth about it.

I won't,he had said to Denys. God, do you think I want her into that tape?

She hasn't got it,Denys had assured him. And won't get it.

Yet—had been his thought.

There was nothing but worry in the look Ari gave him.

"It's not easy," he said, "to be under suspicion—all the time. That's the way I live, Ari. And I never did anything. I was seventeen when it happened."

"I know that," she said. "I'll talk to Denys. I'll make it so you can go visit when you like,"

It was everything he had hoped for. "Right now—" he said, "there's too much going on in the world. The mess in Novgorod. The same reason they have you flying with an escort. There's a military base right next to Planys. The airport is in between the two. Your uncle Denys is worried they might try to grab my father; or me. I'm grounded until things settle down. I can't even talk to him on the phone. —And Grant's never even gotten to go. Grant—was like his second son."

"Damn," she said, "I'm sorry. But you willget to see him. Grant, too. I'll do everything I can."

"I'd be grateful."

"Justin, —does your father hate me?"

"No. Absolutely not."

"What does he say about me?"

"We stay off that subject," he said. "You understand—every call I make to him, every second I spend with him—there's always somebody listening. Talking about you—could land me back in Detention."

She looked at him a long time. Shock, no. But they had not told her that, maybe. There was a mix of expressions on her face he could not sort out.

"Your father's a Special," she said. "Yanni says you ought to be."

"Yanni says. I doubt it. And they're not even going to allow the question—because they can't touch my father—legally—so they don't want meunreachable. You understand."

That was another answer that bothered her. Another moment of silence.

"Someday," he said, "when things are quieter, someday when you're running Reseune—I hope you'll take another look at my father's case. You could do something to help him. I don't think anyone else ever will. Just—ask him—the things you've asked me." But, O God, the truth . . . about that tape; about Art; the shock of that—no knowing what that will do to her.

She'snot like her predecessor. She's a decent kid.

That tape's as much a rape of her—as me.

God, God, when'sshe going to get the thing? Two more years?

When she's seventeen?

"Maybe I will," she said. "—Justin, whydid he do it?"

He shook his head, violently. "Nobody knows. Nobody really knows. Temper. God knows they didn't get along."

"You're his replicate."

He lost his breath a moment. And got caught looking her straight in the eyes.

"You don't have a temper like that," she said. "Do you?"

"I'm not like you," he said. "I'm just his twin. Physical resemblance, that's all."

"Did he fight with a lot of people?"

He tried to think what to say; and came up with: "No. But he and Ari had a lot of professional disagreements. Things that mattered to them. Personalities, mostly."

"Yanni says you're awfully good."

He wobbled badly on that shift of ground and knew she had seen the relief. "Yanni's very kind."

"Yanni's a bitch," she laughed. "But I like him. —He says you work deep-set stuff."

He nodded. "Experimental." He was glad to talk about his work. Anything but the subject they had been on.

"He says your designs are really good. But the computers keep spitting out Field Too Large."

"They've done some other tests."

"I'd like you to teach me," she said.

"Ari, that's kind of you, but I don't think your uncle Denys would like that. I don'tthink they want me around you. I don't think that's ever going to change."

"I want you to teach me," she said, "what you're doing."

He found no quick answer then. And she waited without saying a thing.

"Ari, that's mywork. You know there is a little personal vanity involved here—" Truth, he was disturbed; cornered; and the child was innocent in it, he thought, completely. "Ari, I've had little enough I've really done in my hie; I'd at least like to do the first write-up on it, before it gets sucked up into someone else's work. If it's worth anything. You know there issuch a thing as professional jealousy. And you'll do so much in your life. Leave me my little corner."

She looked put off by that. A line appeared between her brows. "I wouldn't steal from you."

He made it light, a little laugh, grim as it was. "You know what we're doing. Arguing like the first Ari and my father. Over the same damn thing. You're trying to be nice. I know that—"

"I'm not trying to be nice. I'm asking you."

"Look, Ari, —"

"I won't steal your stuff. I don't carewho writes it up. I just want you to show me what you do and how you do it."

He sat back. It was a corner she backed him into, a damned, petulant child used to having her way in the world. "Ari, —"

"I needit, dammit!"

"You don't geteverything you need in this world."

"You're saying I'd steal from you!"

"I'm not saying you'd steal. I'm saying I've got a few rights, Ari, few as they are in this place—maybe I want my name on it. Andmy father's. If just because it's the same last name."

That stopped her. She thought about it, staring at him.

"I can figure that," she said. "I can fixthat. I promise you. I won't take anything you don't want me to. I don't lie,Justin. I don't tell lies. Not to my friends. Not in important things. I want to learn. I want you to teach me. Nobody in the House is going to keep me from having any teacher I want. And it's you."

"You know—if you get me in trouble, Ari, you know what it can do."

"You're not going to get in any trouble. I'm a wing supervisor. Even if I haven't got a wing to work in. So I can make my own, can't I? You. And Grant."

His heart went to long, painful beats. "I'd rather not be transferred."