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be—I'd like you to stay."
    "There is no other place I wish to be," he said—and that was truth, gods pity him, though he could think of a dozen places he might otherwise be needed, not forgetting his mother's drawing room and the bridge of the trade ship orbiting Liad.
    He picked up the wineglass and placed it in her hand as he rose. "Drink your wine, my friend. I will be back in a moment with food."
     
    IT WAS SOME time later , after the odd sweet-spicy food was eaten and the wine, but for the little remaining in their glasses, was drunk, before she thought to ask him.
    "But, Er Thom, what are you doing on University? Another trade mission? There isn't anything to trade for here, is there?"
    "To trade for? No . . ." He took a sip of the sticky yellow wine, then, with sudden decision, finished the glass.
    "I am not here to trade," he told her, watching as if from a distance as his traitor body slid closer to her on the sofa and his hand lifted to fondle her hair. "What I am doing is seeing you."
    She laughed softly as she set aside her glass. "Of course you are," she murmured, gently mocking.
    She did not believe him! Panic galvanized him. She must believe, or all he had meant to accomplish by this mad breaking with custom was gone for naught. The Healers would take him, and reft him of distress, and it would be forgot, unknown, lost in a swirl of blurry dreaming . . .
    His fingers tightened in her hair, pulling her down as he tipped his face up to hers, hungrily, despairingly.
    She came willingly, as she ever had, her mouth firm and sweet on his, calling forth the desire, the need, that had been touched by no other, before or since. The need that burned away names, clans and duty, leaving only she . . . and he.
     
    LATER YET , and she asleep. Er Thom shifted onto an elbow, letting the light from the living area fall past his shoulder and onto her.
    A Liaden would not count her beautiful. He believed that even among Terrans she was considered but moderately attractive. Certainly her face was too full for Liaden taste, her nose too long, her mouth too wide, her skin merely brown, not golden. And while chestnut was a very pretty color for hair, Anne wore hers with an eye to ease of care.
    The rest of her was as strange to the standard of beauty he acknowledged: Her breasts, brown as her face and rosy brown at the very tips, were round and high, larger than his hand could encompass. She was saved from being top-heavy by the width of her hips, flaring unexpectedly from a narrow waist, and she moved with a pilot's smooth grace. Her hands were long-fingered and strong—musician's hands—and her voice was quite lovely.
    He thought of the face of the latest proposed to him: Properly Liaden, well-mannered and golden. A person who understood duty, who would do as she was bid by her delm. And who would very properly rebuke Er Thom yos'Galan, should he but reach out a finger to trace the line of her cheek, or lay his lips against hers.
    But I do not want her! he thought, plaintive, childish, undutiful—strange. As strange as lying here in this present, in a too-large bed, his arms about a woman not of his kind, who expected him to sleep next to her the night full through; to be there when she awoke . . .
    Carefully, he slid down until his eyes were on a level with her closed eyes. For a long while, he stared into her unbeautiful, alien face, watching—guarding—her sleep. Finally, he moved his head to kiss her just-parted lips and said at last the thing he had come to tell her, the thing which must not be forgotten.
    "I love you, Anne Davis."
    His voice was soft and not quite steady, and he stumbled over the Terran words, but it hardly mattered. She was asleep and did not hear him.
     

Chapter Five
Melant'i —A Liaden word denoting the status of a person within a given situation. For instance, one person may fulfill several roles: Parent, spouse, child, mechanic, thodelm. The shifting winds of circumstance, or