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QUETZAL'S FLOCK<br />
underneath the hood of the Kous. It fell loose to her waist, she looked like a young<br />
girl. It was impossible to accept that she was eight thousand years old.<br />
He brushed against her, as she held the tent flap open for him to enter. It hadn't<br />
been deliberate on his part. There was a fragrance, it might have been a perfume,<br />
although he couldn't imagine what could be used as ingredients. He was aware that<br />
she had also made herself ready for him.<br />
"What is it you want to say, Kane Ashford."<br />
She spoke in Solari, it was the only sign of unbending, she hadn't invited him<br />
to make himself comfortable. It looked as if he was expected do his negotiations<br />
standing, draped in the heavy Kous. It wasn't the way he wanted it.<br />
"I want to talk to you about us and the things which have happened since - er -<br />
before."<br />
She was stiff faced and silent. He exploded.<br />
"Damn it, Ajanta! I can't talk to you dressed up in this thing - I feel like a<br />
messenger boy!"<br />
A ghost of a smile touched her lips, it didn't reach her eyes, she was still wary.<br />
"Still the same old Kane. If you feel in the wrong, you start to bluster!"<br />
"I don't feel in the wrong! If you listen to what I have to say, you might agree<br />
that there isn't any right or wrong about the situation."<br />
She contemplated him silently.<br />
"I know your tricks, Kane Ashford. If I tell you take off your Kous, it's as good<br />
as inviting you to go to bed!"<br />
He raised his eyebrows in mock astonishment.<br />
"If that's all that's worrying you. I promise to act like a perfect gentleman -<br />
boring though that might be - and only suggest going to bed, if you suggest it first!"<br />
He grinned and slowly, she thawed and smiled back. He undid the tie of the<br />
Kous and allowed it to drop to the ground. She indicated a place on a pile of hides,<br />
waited until he was seated and then sat herself, some distance away. She folded her<br />
hands and calmly waited for him to begin.<br />
He went through the entire story from beginning to end. He started with his<br />
own birth, childhood and adulthood on Mars and then progressed to the method of his<br />
arrival on Lynxe. He glossed over the episodes of Hara and Maia and then explained<br />
how he had left Lynxe and his arrival on Jubal. He paused and saw the puzzlement in<br />
her eyes, he continued.<br />
"Ajanta, I'm a traveller in time. It's very hard to explain in simple words, but<br />
travelling in the Psi isn't necessarily in chronological order. I can go from one world<br />
to another and then come back to the first, earlier than my first visit. I want to make<br />
you understand, I haven't met you yet! We haven't loved and conceived a child! It's<br />
not that I can't remember, it's simply that it hasn't happened yet for me - but it will!"<br />
He paused again and floundered on, trying to make her understand and all the<br />
time, she continued to stare at him, making the recitation seem all the more<br />
unbelievable, even to himself. In the end he faltered into silence and stared at her<br />
helplessly.<br />
"Well, say something!"<br />
She gave him a severe look, but her mouth seemed a little softer.<br />
"That's the best story I've heard in a few thousand of your years! There would<br />
be some of our young bucks who would give their eye teeth to get their mouths<br />
around it. It's too improbable not to be true! I believe you, Kane. Thousands wouldn't!<br />
I'm like a wife who's husband comes home and says: 'Sorry I'm late, dear, but actually,<br />
we've never met before. How's the children!'. Kane Ashford, I have the feeling that<br />
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