When the piercing wail of a newborn cut through the soft rustling of leaves, Cassandra nearly turned around to go back to the village. For all her placid words to Viyar yesterday, Cassandra had no desire to congratulate Chelle and Connor on the birth of their baby. Or to see them. Or their child.

But Viyar lived close to the cabins of Chelle and Connor and Filip, and in a small community, encounters were inevitable, so Cassandra kept walking. When she met Chelle walking with her baby wrapped in a sling, Cassandra followed social protocol: greeting them with a smile, admiring the baby, inquiring on the health of the family, asking about the baby's name.

"I like the name Duncan," Chelle said cheerfully, "and—"

—and Cassandra had to forcefully quell a sudden urge to slap the younger woman across the face, because Duncan was her son, hers and Connor's, born on the solstice and carried in their arms on that cold winter night long ago, and Chelle had no right to that name, for Duncan was their firstborn, and nothing and no one could ever replace him, and—

"—and then Connor and I talked about it," Chelle was saying, "and we agreed to pick a completely new name, since we're on a new planet and everything is starting over." She smiled down at the baby, snuggled close against her chest. "Until we decide on a name, we're calling him Peanut."

"Yes," Cassandra agreed with a laugh that was almost real, even as she stepped back from the other woman, out of reach, because an inner ambush by rage could easily erupt. She needed to be careful, and she needed to talk to someone, probably a session with Amanda for emotional dumping and then a session with Karla for problem solving. Maybe formal counseling, if her two friends weren't enough. "Peanut is a good temporary name."

"Are you here to see Filip?" Chelle asked.

"Viyar, actually," Cassandra replied, and she would have said farewell to Chelle then, but Viyar called to them from her porch then came over to see the new baby.

"Come, have a drink with me," Viyar invited next, and they sat in the shade on her porch and sipped bava juice from thick-walled mugs crafted of local clay, while Viyar held the baby and gushed and cooed.

"So, Cassandra," Viyar said, looking up from the infant, "any word on the meeting with the Keepers tomorrow?"

"Karla suggested you stay here and join via tablet, so the psi-static isn't so loud for you."

"Yes, that will work," Viyar said.

"I didn't realize there was a conclave tomorrow," Chelle said in surprise. "But then, since Peanut was born, I haven't been reading my messages every day."

"Not a conclave," Cassandra reassured her. "Just a task force to see if Viyar's suggestion to transfer quickenings to the orb is feasible."

"And if it is?" Viyar asked.

"Then the Keepers meet in conclave and decide upon a recommendation," Cassandra explained. "That gets shared with the community, and all of us vote."

"Could we, should we, will we," Chelle said, quoting the mantra taught to children.

"How very democratic," Viyar noted.

Then Connor came by, and of course Viyar invited him to join them. She handed the baby over to Chelle, saying, "I'll get us more to drink."

"I'll help," Cassandra said quickly and went with her inside the cabin. When they came back out, Chelle was seated cross-legged on the floor with the baby on her lap, and Connor was nearby on the steps. Connor had set his sword near at hand, for he continued to wear it at all times, despite repeated assurances that it wasn't needed and the frequent sidelong glances and occasional comments.

"Did you want to hold Peanut, Cassandra?" Chelle offered.

"He seems very happy where he is," Cassandra said with a smile, relieved to have escaped that test. Viyar handed Connor a cup then took a seat on the steps, while Cassandra copied Chelle's position and sat on the porch floor cross-legged with her back against the wall of the house.

"Viyar, Connor told me you weren't a Watcher," Chelle said. "How did you learn about immortals?"

"I was part of a research team in the Seer Guild trying to develop psionic crystals. They told three of us about Immortals and the talismans, with instructions to keep that secret. When I was fourteen, I had met Cassandra, and I was having dreams about finding her, so I volunteered to research the talismans in the Chronicles."

"Is that when you acquired the weaving that Connor and I made?" Cassandra asked.

Viyar nodded. "I made a replica and then I stole the original."

Chelle laughed aloud. "Oh, Amanda will love that!"

"Connor, do you still have the weaving?" Cassandra hadn't seen it on her brief visit to his cabin six days before.

He shrugged one shoulder. "It's somewhere in my gear."

Probably buried among dirty socks and old shoes. "I'd like to have it," she told him. "Since you don't want it anymore."

Viyar drew a quick breath, and Connor stared at Cassandra for the space of two heartbeats before saying, "Fine."

"Good." Cassandra ignored Chelle's narrow-eyed glances from her to Connor and back again and instead turned to Viyar. "Did you find anything useful about crystals in the Chronicles?"

"Nothing that worked for us, but it might for immortals. I've been talking with Shariade."

"What else did you work on?" Chelle asked, and she and Viyar began discussing medical things.

Connor, with his legs stretched out and his eyes half-closed, was watching his son sleep. Cassandra had known Connor for a thousand years, and not since his wife Alex had given birth to twins had Cassandra seen that combination of fierce protectiveness and adoring tenderness on his face. Which, she reminded herself, was as it should be. All parents should look upon their infants that way.

"After my fourth child was born," Viyar was saying, "I spent two years at the Healer Guildhouse for advanced training in Sexual Ecstasy."

"That sounds like fun," Chelle said with a grin.

"Oh, yes!" agreed Viyar. "Definitely during the final term. Early on, though, it was mostly studying science: musculature, endocrinology, hormonal systems, classes on the chemistry of pheromones and the physics of vibration."

"Chemistry and physics?" Chelle asked.

"The voice can be a powerful tool, and specific vibrations make it sexy. Scent is crucial for most mammals in mate selection. Humans not so much, but we still respond to it, even if subliminally. In the class on Seduction Techniques, we learned to implement those arousal factors. The next–"

Viyar stopped abruptly as Connor uncoiled from his relaxed pose. "Who can take this training?" he asked.

"Advanced Training classes are restricted to Sisters. Basic Sexuality is available to everyone at all schools, of course."

Then he turned to Cassandra. "How many immortals have joined the Sisterhood?"

"Hundreds of immortals abandoned as infants grew up in Sisterhood schools. A few dozen of those chose to stay, while some came as adults, seeking the safety of Holy Ground."

"Which is worthless," he pointed out.

"Not to those still playing the Game."

Connor didn't bother to argue with her, just moved on. "Chelle, you said that ninety years ago, you made sure that all immortal women knew they could have children."

"Yes, we talked to most in person, and we sent information to a few."

Connor nodded slowly. "Karla told me yesterday that the Watchers figured it out a few years after that, and a lot of the immortal men did, too."

"It's hard to keep a secret when so many people know," Cassandra observed

"Especially with spies watching you," Connor commented dryly.

"They're not watching anymore," Viyar told them. "About thirty-five years ago, I heard that the Sisterhood was archiving all the chronicles. They disbanded the Watchers soon after, which implies they knew that with no more women, there could be no new immortals."

"But the last woman in their chronicles died four decades before they shut down the Watchers," Chelle pointed out. "Why wait?"

"Why hurry?" Viyar countered, a standard Sisterhood reply. "Probably Head Watcher Giorgis wanted to be thorough."

"Head Watcher Giorgis?" Connor repeated then swore softly and viciously in his mother tongue of Gaelic, with mention of sheep and nuns doing unmentionable things.

"What did Giorgis do?" Chelle wanted to know.

"Nothing. That's the point. As Head Watcher, she must have known about our children. She never told me."

"Observe and record," Chelle recited dryly. "Never interfere."

"That's the Watcher creed," Viyar said. "The Sisterhood's motto is 'We exist to serve'."

"Serve who?" Chelle asked pointedly.

"All of humankind," Viyar answered firmly. "The Sisterhood has done much good."

"Their public work, yes," Chelle agreed. "Hospitals, schools, research … everyone benefits from those. But we all know they have a shadow side."

Everything did, even shadows themselves. "Connor, where are you going with this?" Cassandra asked, but he had already closed his eyes. From across the porch, Cassandra cataloged the minute symptoms of Connor's rage: the careful breathing, slow and deep, the fingers curled into near fists, the compression of his lips and the flare of his nostrils, his head shaking ever so slightly from side to side, the tightness of his jaw.

When he did finally speak, the words came slow, vicious, and implacable: "That conniving cunt."

All three women flinched, and Chelle and Cassandra exchanged looks of alarm. Even when Connor had been furious enough to threaten to take Cassandra's head, he hadn't used that word. She took some comfort in knowing that he wasn't angry with any of them right now.

After a moment, Chelle softly called his name, obviously knowing better than to touch him. After a few deep breaths, he opened his eyes and even managed a smile for her.

"Still Giorgios?" Viyar ventured.

That got a bark of bitter laughter. "No. Though it applies. I meant Baranova Yanlei, an immortal woman I met in space-tech school off Gessert thirty-five years ago."

"Damn it," Chelle swore softly, then turned to Cassandra. "I thought our scrying circles had located all the women."

"So did I," Cassandra agreed. "Yanlei must have been physically dead, like Connor was, or in cryosleep, so we missed her in the scans."

"So you didn't tell her about the children?" Connor asked.

"Right," Chelle said, "because we didn't know she existed."

"But she could have heard about it from another immortal," Connor persisted. "Or her Watcher. Or someone else in the Sisterhood."

"Almost none of the sisters would know," Viyar pointed out. "Only the Watchers and a few others knew about Immortals, and even a Watcher might not have known about the children. The Chronicles said nothing about them; I learned of them only when I came here."

"They probably sequestered that information, perhaps even in the Council's vault," Cassandra said. "Only Tribunes have access to that." They could discuss that later; she needed to know what had Connor in a rage. "Connor, what did Yanlei do?"

"She tried to seduce me."

"Hell, I've done that," Chelle said immediately. "So has Cassandra. You didn't mind."

"Yeah, but neither one of you knew you could get pregnant. Yanlei did."

"How do you know that?" Viyar asked.

"Yanlei smelled good," he explained. The muscle in his jaw twitched. "Really good. As in 'pheromones as a seduction technique' good."

Viyar made a tiny nod of the head without the slightest change of expressions, but even so, Connor fixed her with a glare and demanded, "What?"

She hesitated, and Cassandra urged quietly, "Tell him the truth," because she knew Connor wouldn't tolerate any more lies or evasions, and they all needed to understand what was going on.

Viyar spoke, though she avoided his gaze, "Our first night on ship together, while I was still adjusting my shields, you dreamed of her. And her scent."

Connor closed his eyes again and released a very slow sigh. "Fuck."

Chelle reached out to him this time. "Connor…"

"I am so tired," he said, and he even sounded tired now, instead of angry, "of people fucking with me."

Cassandra wasn't convinced. "We can't be sure—"

"I'm sure," he interrupted. "Yanlei was an immortal member of the sisterhood, trained in advanced seduction techniques, trying to use me to get pregnant."

"If she knew—and maybe she didn't—then it could be Yanlei just wanted a baby," Chelle suggested. "The male immortals we left behind were scum, so you were probably the only decent one she'd seen in half a century."

"That does not give her the right to use me as a stud," he bit out.

"No, but—"

"Sexual activity without full knowledge and consent— that's the definition of rape, isn't it?" he demanded.

"Yes," Cassandra agreed, because Connor was right and he deserved validation, not second-guessing, denials, gas-lighting, hearing "lie back and enjoy it", and being doubted by everyone he told. "To use someone that way is a horrendous violation. It is rape."

"Right," Chelle said, nodding in understanding now, and she reached out her hand. "I'm so sorry, Connor. What she did was awful. To you and the baby, because it's child-stealing, too."

He took her hand and held tightly, but also said, "There is no baby. I never had sex with Yanlei."

"Oh," Chelle said in surprise then smiled. "Well … good."

Cassandra was feeling the same mix of surprise and approval, though she had pity for Yanlei, too, if that was truly what she had tried to do. Immortal males (and not just Roland) were likely to kill their infant children, so immortal females had to hide and lie and deceive.

"One more thing," Connor said. "Yanlei wasn't acting alone. The morning I left the station, I saw the Tribune of the Healer Guild coming on board."

For Cassandra, that reduced the likelihood of conspiracy. A Tribune would not have been stupid enough to let Connor see her. But he was convinced, and she was not going to argue this with him.

Viyar, however, was nodding slowly. "The archiving of the Watcher Chronicles was assigned to the Healer Guild, instead of the Seeker Guild, which usually handles all libraries, or to the Guardians, which was the Watchers home guild. I remember thinking how odd that was."

Connor snapped his fingers then pointed at Cassandra, who did not care to be beckoned to like a dog. "About four hundred years ago," he said, "you told me that the Healer Guild was lobbying to get the Watchers reassigned to them."

"Yes. The Council denied it, because mission and training did not align. Though, of course, the Healer Guild has always hoped to use the quickening energy to heal mortals, so they did work with Immortals; they just didn't watch them." Cassandra went back to the seductress. "Connor, do you know how old Yanlei is?"

"About three-fifty, if her story about beheading Linney Tolliver soon after she became an immortal is true. His chronicle said the killer was unknown."

"Could you sketch her?" Chelle asked, handing her tablet to Connor. "Maybe we know her by another name."

Using the stylus, Connor rapidly sketched the face of the woman then turned the tablet so they could all see. He had also added biometrics: BioAge: thirty. Height: 170 cm. Build: slender. Eyes: brown. Hair: dark brown. Skin tone: tan. If Cassandra had met Yanlei on Earth, she would have guessed an ethnic group with origins in Central Asia, but that meant very little these last thousand years, with all the mingling going on.

"She's very pretty," Viyar commented.

She was indeed, and judging from the quick—yet very detailed—drawing, Connor had spent a lot of time looking at this woman, as well as dreaming about her and her scent.

"Let's see if anyone else recognizes her." Chelle's fingers moved rapidly on the tablet as she sent the picture to the tablets of the original settlers. "I'm also starting a facial-recognition scan with a youth-mask, but remember: our records are slim and we haven't had updates from the other planets or the Chronicles for nearly a century."

"I have more recent information," Viyar volunteered. "The name Baranova Yanlei wasn't in the Chronicles when I looked at them sixty years ago. Her picture wasn't in there, either."

"So either her chronicle was sequestered, or the Watchers never knew about her," Chelle said. "That's not unlikely; there are a lot of planets to cover, and the Watchers have been stretched thin for a long while now."

"It could also be," Connor said, "that the Healers knew about her and trained her, but they kept her hidden from the Watchers — and everyone else — all these years."

"How?" Chelle asked. "Was she a prisoner? Or under mind control?"

"Mind control would be clumsy," Viyar noted. "It's more effective to rescue a child from an orphanage, protect it, train it, offer it a family and a home — what foundling would turn that down? They would become loyal members of your guild."

Connor swore in Gaelic again. "Mind control by another name."

"But not psychic mindfuckery, as you like to call it," Viyar told him tartly.

"Any responses to Yanlei's picture yet, Chelle?" Cassandra asked.

Chelle checked her tablet. "Just a few. No one recognizes her."

"None of us will know her," Connor predicted. "She's always been hidden."

"Why?" Cassandra asked, because he was spinning off into wild conjecture now.

"Experiments? To find other immortals for them?" His jaw tightened once more. "To breed children for them?"

Protecting endangered species had always been part of their mission. Cassandra decided not to mention that.

Connor's hard gaze was trained directly on her. "Tell me again, Cassandra: why the hell did you start that group?"

"To save all humankind, not just serve it," she answered. "Six hundred years ago, as you should recall, civilization was thrashing in its death throes, and the Earth was dying bloody, bit by bit. Your wife and I decided to try to help, and as I recall, you—and Duncan and Amanda and even Methos—joined in. We started organizations of mortals, because we needed all hands. The Sisterhood salvaged what it could. We would not be here if they hadn't."

"Maybe so," he allowed, "but they've been breeding psychics for centuries. What makes you think they wouldn't breed us, too?"

"They would have told me," she protested. "I would have known."

His expression shifted slowly from disbelief to pity. "I know you're not this stupid," he told her. "So I'm guessing you're blinding yourself right now. Or maybe one of their psychics has mind-fucked you somehow. But your Sisterhood, Cassandra, or maybe just the Healer Guild, is treating us like breeding stock."

Cassandra didn't protest, didn't even take it seriously, and there was no point to arguing, not here and now, when their entire relationship had imploded and the sharp edges of it lay all around.

Connor got to his feet, and his sword was in his hand. Cassandra stayed where she was, on the porch with her back against the wall of the house, and Connor's child asleep between them, and said nothing. For she knew words might come with the tearful breakdown that had been threatening for days, ever since he had told her to leave. Or her inner rage might erupt into the murder of his new partner and their infant child. So she did not move.

"Maybe," Connor said, "they've been taking Immortal children for centuries."

"That's—"

"They watched you, Cassandra, all the time. How many immortal infants were found while I was visiting you at one of their schools?"

"I don't—"

"How many of our children—yours and mine, Cassandra!—did they steal?"

Cassandra said nothing, because he wasn't listening to her anyway. He didn't want to hear anything she had to say. He was paranoid and suspicious; the Game had made him that way. So had she, through brutal training within a web of lies.

"I am so fucking tired of being fucked with," Connor told her, and again, he didn't sound angry, just utterly weary. "I'm tired of nothing being what it seems." Then he laid a gentle hand on his son, kissed Chelle quickly, and walked away.

Cassandra watched him until he was lost to sight amid the tall grasses under the trees. Then she realized that both Chelle and Viyar were watching her. "What?" Cassandra said.

"Where to start?" Chelle said sarcastically.

Viyar stood immediately. "I'll give you two some time." She left the porch to go for a walk beneath the trees.

"I didn't think you would be this bothered by me partnering with Connor," Chelle said, straight to the point as always.

Neither had Cassandra.

Chelle leaned her back against the house wall, careful not to disturb the baby in her lap. "The three of us have been swapping for the past five hundred years, and you're with Methos now, so I figured it was my turn to be with Connor."

"Yes," Cassandra agreed, for Chelle was being practical and reasonable, and immortals usually made arrangements that way.

"He called me," Chelle went on.

"I'm sure he did," Cassandra murmured. Probably the day after he had told Cassandra to leave. Possibly even that night.

"He said things were settled between you two. So what am I missing here, Cass?"

"I'm his mother, Chelle," Cassandra reminded her.

"Yeah, his bio-mother. So?"

"So he doesn't want me anymore, and I'll never have another turn again."

"You're kidding. He's…?" She shook her head. "Hunh. I thought 'settled' meant you'd stay partners with Methos until your kids were grown."

"Settled meant over. Completely." She stared off into the trees. "I'll never give him a child."

"You two have had at least nine." Chelle sounded puzzled.

"But none that we knew about." She looked at Connor's baby, still sound asleep, and tears came to her eyes. "None that we will share."

"Ah, damn," Chelle said softly. She offered her hand, which Cassandra took hold of and held on, while with her other hand she wiped away tears. "I'm so sorry, Cassandra. I didn't realize."

"I should have talked to you earlier. But at first, it was too raw, and then the baby came, and then…"

"I get it; I've been there." Chelle's smile was wry with personal knowledge. "You didn't want to."

"I didn't want to," Cassandra agreed. She sorted through her emotions. "I'm not angry with you, Chelle. With him, yes, but with you … I am feeling jealous right now."

"I get that," Chelle said again.

"I do want him to be happy," Cassandra said, and that was true. "And I'm glad, mostly, that he's with you."

"I believe you," Chelle said and squeezed her hand. "But you also want him to be happy with you."

"Yes," Cassandra whispered. But Connor wasn't, and he never would be again.

She had grieved over this already, wept for the permanent loss of both lover and friend nearly a century ago. But Connor wasn't dead, which meant she didn't have to lose everything. They could still be friends. They'd done that before.

"You know," Chelle said, "if Yanlei really is three-hundred-fifty, her parents might be me and Connor." She grunted softly. "I don't think I'll mention that."

"No need," Cassandra agreed. Connor could do the math. He probably already had. "How is he settling in, here on Valinor?"

"Slowly. He's still learning to deal with big groups of us, both physically and mentally, so we've stayed in the cabins mostly. Especially those first few days, when—"

"Right," Cassandra interrupted. Connor had no doubt exhibited enthusiasm and stamina.

"He has been practicing with his crystal. And he's been meeting with old friends, one at a time. Urushan came by, and they played chess. Robert was here yesterday. They went hiking somewhere."

"Any sparring?"

"Oh, yeah, they both brought swords. That got an audience — you know how loud swords are. Your boy Filip came over to watch both times."

Cassandra decided to ask Methos to talk with their son. "Does Connor wear his sword all the time?"

"Whenever he leaves the cabin. He grew up wearing one, so he said it feels like he's back home."

He wasn't "back home." He was in a new home, and it had different rules. "Is he going to start wearing a kilt?"

"I hope so," Chelle said, grinning. "It makes it easier to—"

"Right," Cassandra interrupted again. She remembered kilts. "I hear he's been missing appointments."

"We have a newborn." Chelle shrugged. "Schedules are hard to keep."

"He's missed every appointment, Chelle. With the genetic council, the school, the counselors, the classes on crystals, the labor board..."

"I did mention some of those."

"He's not answering messages," Cassandra continued. "Most of them he never even reads."

"Damn it, Cassandra, what do you expect me to do?" Chelle sounded exasperated. "I'm not his mother."

"Well, I am," she shot back. "And he's not going to listen to me!"

Chelle stared at her, mouth open, and then she started to laugh. Cassandra joined in, because the whole situation was absurd and insane, and neither of them had ever been able to tell Connor what to do. Then tears came, hot and bitter, and the laughter faded away.

When the tears stopped — at least for now — Cassandra rubbed her hands over her face then wiped her eyes. She and Chelle exchanged rueful smiles.

"We both know Connor can be an idiot sometimes," Chelle said. "But he's a good guy."

"I know." He was also her friend, and he clearly needed help. "Connor said he would take the oath of our settlement, but I don't think he's even read it."

"Probably not," Chelle agreed. Her fingers picked aimlessly at a slub in the weave of Peanut's blanket.

"That responsibility is his, not yours, I know, but he needs to understand the consequences of what he's doing."

"You mean what he's not doing." Chelle sighed and leaned her head back, then thudded it against the wall a few times. "I'll talk to him." She looked down at her baby in her lap, who stirred and gave the tiniest of yawns. "After all, Peanut, I don't want you to grow up without a father."