slowly shift as they followed the constellation, as it turned on the heavenly wheel.  It would cause them to go more and more south as the days passed, keeping the constellation firmly in front of the bow.  That was why they didn't just sail as soon as they got onto the ship, because of that alteration of course.  Tarrin knew that a good astronomer with complete charts could probably navigate the course without having to leave at the summer solstice, but there would be a good margin of error there, and this was no time for error.  From the way it sounded to him from the poem, what they were looking for would be very hard to find, so they had to be exactly right the first time.  With all that competition out there, sailing around in circles would be a very bad idea.  Besides, there was another time constraint hanging over their heads, that being the day that the Firestaff would be activated.  Tarrin didn't know what day that was, but it had to be soon.  The Firestaff had awakened and revealed itself to the world, and to Tarrin, that meant that the day of its complete activation had to be very close.
	Actually, Tarrin would be overjoyed if that day came and went while they were still out to sea, still trying to get it.  It meant that the day passed without anyone finding it, and then they could all just go home and not worry about it anymore.  But that was a pipe dream, and he knew it.  The Goddess wouldn't have sent him if things were going to be that easy.  No, there had to be enough time for someone to have a reasonable chance to figure out where it was and how to get to it, even without the advantages that Tarrin had.  If only Tarrin and his friends could get to it, then there was no real need to go after it in the first place.
	But they were that much closer.  The ship represented that, another major landmark on the long, twisting, crooked road down which the Goddess had sent him.  There had been quite a few twists and turns on that road, and more than a fair share of shocks and surprises.  But all in all, looking back on it, given the bad and the good, he was glad he did it.  He'd seen so much, learned so much, and had had the chance to make such great and lasting friends.  He'd stood at the top of the world and flown with the angels, he'd moved the world with his footsteps, he'd faced the spawns of the Abyss and seen that miracles did in fact happen.  It had only been some couple of months over two years since the fateful day that Dolanna and Faalken had led him out of Aldreth, but it seemed a lifetime.  Alot of it was spent in fear or pain or misery, but now things looked much better than they did then.  All in all, he was content with the way things had turned out so far.
	If anything, he'd have some wild tales to tell his children and grandchildren.
	More smoke began issuing up from the twin metal pipes on the ship, like the chimney of a fireplace, and there was a strange rhythmic metalling banging coming from it.  The ship shuddered visibly, and then there was a loud pop, which even vibrated the water lapping at the steamship's hull.  And then the smoke began to thin and the metallic sounds ceased.  The human, Donovan Thane, swore sulfurously and rushed out of sight, probably going down to see what had just happened.
	Whatever it was, Tarrin hoped it was a good thing.  That contraption suddenly looked quite ominous to him, an unknown thing with dangers he couldn't imagine.  Keritanima said that the steam engines had a bad habit of exploding.  Tarrin certainly didn't want that to happen while they were on the ship in which the steam engine was contained.  That would not be a very pleasant experience, to say the least.
	It didn't take Tarrin and Kimmie long to pack their things, since they'd only really unpacked the clothes.  Keritanima sent a sailor to tell them to be ready to transfer over to the steamship at the top of the hour, so they spent the time waiting up on deck, Tarrin shielding them both from the rain, as he and Kimmie looked at the ship and Tarrin listened politely as Kimmie described the progress Phandebrass had been making on his memory spell, stroking Sapphire's scales as she was held in the female Were-cat's arms.  "I think he's almost got it," Kimmie announced after telling him about the session they'd had the day before.  "He cast it on himself and read a Wikuni book until the spell expired.  Though he doesn't speak the language, he was able to perfectly copy the writing on the first ten pages, what he was able to read before the spell ended, and he retained the memory of it.  He says he can't get it out of his head, since he doesn't understand what the words mean.  He said it's like a piece of art that's so engaging that it haunts you for days," she chuckled.
	"It does sound like he did it.  Too bad he can't use it on you."
	"Why not?" she protested.  "The spell is safe now!"
	"Triana said no spells cast on you unless I cast them.  As soon as Phandebrass teaches me how to use Wizard magic and then teaches me the spell, I'll be happy to do it for you."
	Kimmie glared at him.  "Then how am I going to learn Sha'Kar?" she demanded.
	"Hold on."  He raised his head.  "Mother, can I cast the memory spell on someone else?"
	Yes, you can, came her mental response.  A Sorcerer can only cast it on himself, but a Priest can cast it on another.
	"There, that settles that," he told her.  "I can cast the same spell I used to learn Wikuni on you, so you can learn Sha'Kar."
	"Who were you asking?  Triana?"
	"The Goddess," he replied calmly.
	"You have her at your beck and call now?" Kimmie asked.
	"No, it's more like she seems to know when I'm about to ask her a question, so she comes to me and answers it.  Sometimes I wonder how she knows," he mused to himself.
	"She is a god, Tarrin," Kimmie chuckled.  "If she didn't know, she wouldn't be a very good god, would she?"
	"You have a point," he acceded.
	Not long after that, sailors packed their belongings in a longboat and ferried it over to the steamship, and then longboats were brought up for the passengers.  Keritanima and Miranda were the first ones to board the longboats, with Binter and Sisska attending them.  Tarrin, Kimmie, Azakar, and Allia boarded the next one, and Camara Tal, Dar, Phandebrass, and Azakar boarded the last.  Boarding the longboats was almost fun for Tarrin and Kimmie, since they had to climb down a ladder to the boat.  The boat rocked alarmingly as Tarrin put a foot down in it, but in a few moments it became almost enjoyable to feel the boat sway as Kimmie, Dolanna, and Allia joined them.  Four burly Wikuni manned the ship's oars, and then they pushed off from the Royal vessel and rowed for the steamship anchored not far away.  Sapphire flew over them, turning circles in the air so as not to get too far ahead, but then Chopstick and Turnkey interrupted her waiting circle and distracted the blue drake into a game of airborne chase.  The three drakes zipped off into the rain happily, quickly travelling out of sight.  Tarrin wasn't worried, however.  Sapphire could find her way back once she caught the two red drakes.
	As Tarrin climbed up onto the deck of the steamship, he saw Keritanima was standing on the deck with Miranda beside her, talking to the Tellurian, Donovan Thale.  That close to him, Tarrin saw that he was a world different from Phandebrass.  For one, he filled out his cloak.  Donovan Thale was a burly, muscular man with a barrel chest and remarkably thick legs, not very tall, built like a treestump.  He looked a little older than Phandebrass but still had a youthful way about him.  He had swarthy brown skin and white hair, looking a little like Allia in that regard, but now that he was closer he could see that Donovan Thale dyed his hair white.  It wasn't natural.  The roots of his shortly cropped hair were black, and that made him look more like an Arakite.  His features had the same sharp quality about them that Arakites did; Tarrin felt that this man had an Arakite for a parent, or at the very least a grandparent.  Around his neck, under his cloak, he saw that the man wore a steel amulet.  The amulet was under his shirt, so he couldn't see the design on it, but it reminded him of the amulet that Camara Tal wore.  All Priests wore such amulets, which had the holy symbol of their gods upon them; in fact, the vast majority of their Priest magic wouldn't function unless they were wearing the amulet.  Tarrin's amulet was radically different from theirs, but the premise was exactly the same.  Without his amulet, he wouldn't be able to use any Priest magic except for a few of the simplest spells.
	Tarrin bent down and helped Kimmie the rest of the way up, who smiled at him in thanks.  He patted her fondly on the bottom as she passed, and she responded by slithering her tail across his torso in a sensual manner.  He reached down and helped Dolanna up the ladder, but his small friend only gave him a smile and warned him not to be quite so friendly with her posterior.  That made Tarrin laugh, and he moved as if to do the same to her as she went by, which made her hurry up a few steps to get out of range.  He helped Allia up, not that she needed any help, and then rejoined his mate as she walked around the deck of the ship.
	It looked alot different from a regular ship.  There were only two masts and much less rigging, so the air above them looked strangely empty.  The thing smelled of smoke and wood and coal, which was understandable, but the simple fact that he could smell it with all the decks being saturated with water and rain still falling heavily told him how pervasive the smell was.  When they got out of the rain, it would be an overwhelming scent, drowning out everything else.  The deck space wasn't empty, it was filled with rows of barrels and boxes, many of them with waterproof canvas tarps thrown over them and tied down.  Keritanima said that there wasn't much free space on the ship, and she was obviously right if they had to store equipment and supplies up on the deck.  Another thing he noticed was how few Wikuni sailors there were.  On the Royal ship, there had to be fifty of them.  But over here, he only saw nine Wikuni on the deck.  But that really didn't mean anything, since the whole crew may not be on board, and that didn't count the Wikuni below decks working on that mechanical contraption that was supposed to propel the ship.  He looked up between the two pipes and saw that the top of the sterncastle was covered over, with many windows along its walls, and that the wheelhouse was inside it.  That, he saw, was a good idea.  The steersman wouldn't have to stand out in the pouring rain, which often made the job a miserable one when the weather was bad.
	"Ah, here you are," Keritanima said as Tarrin and Kimmie wandered over in their general direction as they looked at the ship. "Donovan, this is Tarrin and Kimmie.  Tarrin, Kimmie, may I present Donovan Thale, the man who designed this ship."
	"Not really the ship, just the engine," he said modestly, nodding to them.
	"Don't be modest, Donovan," Keritanima smiled.  "Who else is with you?"
	"My whole team," he replied.  "We're not letting her go out without us here to see how she performs."
	"I thought you said you tested it," Keritanima said flintily.
	"We did, your Majesty, but not under operating conditions," he replied.  "We ran the engine for twelve straight hours, and she did fine.  But you'll be running it for days, non-stop.  She'll hold up, though," he said quickly, "but since we didn't do that, we want to be here to see if we can't improve her design with the next ship we build."
	"And since they'll be right here, if it breaks down, we have the people we need available to fix it," Miranda added.
	"True," Keritanima agreed with a nod.  "When will we be ready to leave?"
	"We're still loading the supplies, so it won't be until tomorrow morning at the very earliest, your Majesty," Donovan replied.  "But since this is a first for all of us, I'd like to doublecheck everything one more time, so I'd like to leave no sooner than tomorrow afternoon."
	"We'll be leaving tomorrow night, after sunset," she told him.  "That gives you a full day and some spare hours to make sure everything's ready before hand."
	"Yes, your Majesty," he replied calmly.  "Everything will be ready.  You have my guarantee of that, even if I have to step on a few necks to do it."
	"Step away, Donovan.  This journey has the highest priority.  Until we leave, you'll be speaking with my voice."
	"Thank you, your Majesty.  I've been having trouble getting supplies from the other ships and the Vendari.  They keep sending the wrong things.  One fool loaded four barrels of gunpowder in the hold!"
	"Don't all Wikuni ships carry cannons?" Kimmie asked curiously.
	"This ship can't use gunpowder, my Lady," Donovan answered her.  "The steam engine uses a fire to make the steam, and there's always a chance that the fire may get out of control and set off the gunpowder.  I'll be able to design some ships that can carry gunpowder later, but since this is the very first ship of its kind, we don't want to take any chances."
	"A wise precaution," Keritanima assured him.  "The other ships will do the fighting for us if it comes down to it."
	"We thought that too, your Majesty," Donovan nodded.
	A rare reptillian Wikuni, tall and scaly, with a thick, meaty tail, was the one that showed Tarrin and Kimmie to their cabin.  Keritanima's warnings had been correct, for the cabin was very small and very cramped.  It had only a single bed, but at least Keritanima had thought ahead to have a bed installed large enough for him.  It had a large chest at the foot of the bed, which was almost against the opposite wall, and only about seven spans of floor between the bed and the door.  The cabin was not designed for extended stays, that much was for sure.  The place was clean and sterile, but at least the ceiling was high enough to keep Tarrin's head from hitting the low beams that served as the deck of the level above.  It had a window, a small round porthole, over the bed, that had a view of the coastline.  Kimmie opened the chest and looked inside, then chuckled.  "Enough room for our clothes, but not much else," she said.  "I'll have to leave my equipment with Phandebrass."
	"I'd hate to see how much room he'll have when he gets all his things in his cabin," Tarrin noted as he sat down on the bed.  "He may end up sleeping up on deck."
	"As long as he can get from the bed to the door, I think he'll be alright," Kimmie chuckled, reaching down and grabbing his paw.  "Let's go look around.  I want to see this steam engine thing."
	Tarrin and Kimmie joined their other friends in an informal tour of the ship by the man Donovan.  He showed them the steering deck and some of the mecahnical gadgets that would tell the men in the engine room how fast they wanted the ship to go, and then he showed them the engine room.  It took up the entire back half of the ship, forcing everything into the bow.  It was comprised of a huge metal tank of some sort that had a multitude of pipes and metal things running all over it.  Tarrin could see what looked like huge gears that ran from the massive contraption to a heavy shaft that extended out of the wall.  That had to go to the paddlewheel, he realized.  He couldn't make sense of much of anything he saw, but the ten Wikuni and four humans that were in the engine room did seem to know what was going on.  There were levers and dials and wheels and handles scattered along the pipes, set into the equipment, jutting out of walls and the floor, attached to the many pipes that crawled all over the gigantic chamber.  There was a huge door on the far side that led into the other hold that was in the bow, and Tarrin could see that it was filled almost to overflowing with a strange black rock.  Coal.  The smell of the place was certainly unusual, with the wood and tar mixing with the multitudes of copper pipes all over everywhere, and the sweat and fur of the Wikuni and the humans mixing with a riot of other smells he just couldn't identify, because he'd never scented them before.
	"It looks like a convulsing spider," Dar said honestly, which made everyone laugh.
	"I guess it does at that," Donovan chuckled.  "Alright, here's how it works.  We burn coal in that boiler right there, and it boils the water in that big tank right there," he explained, pointing to the indicated components.  "The steam collects in the boiler until it builds up alot of pressure.  Once it does, we open a valve that lets some of the steam escape.  The steam goes through these pipes to the engine itself, where its pressure causes those gears to turn."  He pointed to the gears.  "That area over there allows us to engage different gears to make the paddlewheel outside turn slower or faster, no matter how fast the gears coming out of the steam drive turn.  Leonin calls it a 'gear-force transmission junction,' but that's too long, so we call it the transmission area.  The steam drives the gears and enters these pipes over here, then it collects in that tank over there, what we call a condenser, where seawater flows through pipes inside it to cool the steam back into water.  Once the water collects in the bottom, gravity causes it to drain back into the boiler through those pipes over there.  Some of the steam is bled off to run water pumps that keeps the seawater in the condenser cool."
	"It's all self-contained?" Keritanima asked.
	Donovan nodded.  "We can't use seawater in the boiler because of the salt, and the fact that the water has to be very clean.  So we boiled water and collected the steam back into pure water and injected it into the system.  The same water gets boiled and recondensed back into water over and over again.  It's the most efficient way to go about it, seeing as how fresh water isn't easy to find on the open sea."
	"What happens if you spring a leak?"
	"We'll lose some water no matter what, your Majesty, because some of the steam drives the water pumps and the whistle," he told her.  "We have some barrels of spare water in case of an emergency, and if all else fails, we installed a smaller boiler over there where we can boil the salt out of seawater and use it.  It also doubles as a fresh-water maker, since the water it makes is drinkable.  But we're not going to rely on it quite yet."
	"It all sounds pretty complicated," Dar said.
	"It is until you've been down here a while," Donovan told the youthful Arkisian.
	"I say, you really have to show me the step-by-step procedure," Phandebrass told his countrymen with bright eyes.
	"You'll have to get her Majesty's approval," Donovan told him seriously.  "She funded this project, so she owns the rights to it."
	"You can look, but you will not touch anything," Keritanima told him hotly.  "Do you understand me?  Touch just one control, and I'll have you thrown overboard!"
	"I say, your Majesty, I understand that this is a delicate device, I do," Phandebrass assured her.  "Why, they're working with steam under pressure.  One wrong move, and the whole thing will blow itself up!"
	"You should know about blowing yourself up," Camara Tal grunted.
	Phandebrass ignored that.  "I say, I must get myself a new book.  I'll have to write all this down," he mused to himself.  "I wonder if magic could improve the operation of it."
	"Not unless you know a way to set a fire in the boiler we don't have to feed," Donovan grunted.  "Half the ship is taken up by the engine, and the other half with the coal.  It doesn't leave much room for anything else."
	"It is most impressive," Dolanna said. " More impressive because it does not use magic anywhere in its design."
	"Magic is a strong and respectable force, ma'am, but you'd be surprised what you can do with a little steel, a little creativity, and alot of sweat."
	"Indeed," Dolanna agreed with a nod.
	"Well, that about finishes the tour, your Majesty.  The rest of the ship is like any other."
	"Why do you have sails when you have this thing?" Dar asked curiously.
	"This engine is still experimental," Donovan told him.  "In case it breaks down, the sails make sure the ship isn't dead in the water."
	"A smart precaution," Miranda mused.
	"When you're dealing with a prototype, you have to plan for breakdowns," Donovan told her with a nod.  "It's the nature of the beast, as they say."
	"I hope there won't be too many, Donovan.  We're depending on your ship like we've never depended on anything else."
	"We'll get you to your destination, your Majesty, even if I have to get the whole crew down here and turn the gears by hand."
	"Let's hope it doesn't come to that," Keritanima said with a smile.
	"Let's hope, your Majesty."

	The next day, the day they were to depart, was filled with bustling activity, at least for everyone else.  The activity was taken on with a furious pace, for there had been a break in the rain, a rare break, and the skies remained cloudy and threatening to rain again at any moment.  That gave the workers a certain amount of motivation to get as much done as they could before they started getting wet.
	Tarrin and Kimmie rose with the sun, though Tarrin's back was a little cramped.  The bed was long enough, but it wasn't very wide, and that made him sleep pushed up against the outer wall.  Tarrin dealt with that by expanding the bed a good two spans with magic, until it took up over half of the small cabin.  He also made a small, narrow stand for Sapphire's little bed, which Phandebrass had given to him, since the drake didn't like the idea of sleeping on the floor, since she ended up in bed with them.  Drakes liked to sleep high up, where their ability to fly would allow them to simply escape a predator by jumping out of the nest and catching themselves before they hit the ground.  They were sacrificing some open space, but as long as they had enough room to open the door, it didn't really concern him.  The only things they'd really be doing in the cabin were dressing and sleeping anyway, it was too small for anything else.  Kimmie certainly seemed to prefer losing some space to having to worry about rolling out of the bed as it had been.
	Tarrin and Kimmie let everyone else go about their bustling, as Phandebrass, Dolanna, and Dar attached themselves to the scientists that had made the engine so they could learn about it, as Camara Tal, Azakar, Binter, and Sisska helped out the crew by stowing things and doing the heavy labor sometimes necessary on a ship, where their combined strength could accomplish things that took ten to twelve Wikuni to accomplish, and as Keritanima and Miranda talked with held long council sessions with some Wikuni and Vendari brought from other ships and the shore, organizing what would go on after she left, and organizing the roles of the four ships that would accompany them.  They watched it all go by as Tarrin used the memory spell on Kimmie and used the entire day to do nothing but teach her Sha'Kar, both spoken and written.  Every time he taught her a word, he showed her its written form.  In that one day, Kimmie absorbed a staggering amount of the language, because they devoted an entire sunlight day to the task.  Nearly fifteen hours, breaking only to eat or to stretch and relieve themselves.  Since it was the day of the summer solstice and they were literally right on the equator, it made it the longest day of the year, and they used every minute of it to get Kimmie up with the others.
	The skies remained heavy and ominous most of the day, but to everyone's surprise, they began to clear out about an hour before sunset.  The clouds disappeared with a nearly frightening speed, almost racing out of the sky and disappearing over the eastern horizon.  They cleared out in time for the sun to shine down on the ship not long before it set, casting hot light that almost immediately began to evaporate the water pooled on the deck and clinging to the masts and rigging.  The hot air became almost unbearably muggy as the sun dried out the ship, for the air was strangely still.  There was no wind to pick up the humidity and blow it away.  Sailors began stripping off their clothes as the sunlit minutes passed, until nearly everyone on the ship was wearing as little as they could possibly get away with wearing.  It was worst for the Wikuni, whose pelts trapped the heat and made them all look absolutely miserable.  Except for Keritanima and Miranda, of course, with Keritanima using Sorcery to keep the air around her cool and comfortable.  Keritanima was immune to the heat, but Miranda was not, so she was doing it strictly for Miranda's comfort.  That said a great deal about how Keritanima felt about her maid.
	The heat did cause a slight row, and that came from Camara Tal.  Deciding that her leather haltar, as skimpy as it was, was simply too hot, she simply took it off.  That didn't bother Tarrin or any of the people who knew Camara Tal, since exposing her breasts was not considered a violation of modesty in Amazon society.  For that matter, complete nudity wasn't really a violation of modesty in Amazon society, given that Amazons didn't wear anything under their tripas, and the kilt-like skirts were so short that a stiff breeze exposed everything that most human women fought so hard to conceal.  The only violation of modesty in Amazon society was touching.  Looking was just fine, but one did not touch an Amazon in any sensitive area unless it was explicitely allowed.  It didn't bother any of Camara Tal's friends, nor did it really bother the Wikuni, but it did upset the Tellurians quite a bit, who gawked at her and tried their best to ignore the fact that there was a half-naked woman parading around on the deck.  The fact that she was such a stunningly attractive woman, with appealingly large but not oversized breasts that had not sagged a finger during her life, made ignoring her a very difficult thing to do.
	Kimmie found the entire thing to be quite amusing.  They would pause in their involved teaching session to watch Camara Tal pace up and down the deck with a grim expression, anxiously waiting for them to set sail, and watch the eleven Tellurians on the ship scatter before her like mice before a cat, averting their eyes as she passed but stealing glances at her whenever they could, when they didn't think she was paying attention.  They wanted to look, but they didn't want her to know that they were looking.  That was what amused Kimmie so much.
	As much fun as the uptightness of the humans was, it bowed to their lessons.  By the time sunset came, as the wind suddenly picked up and the sailors hurriedly made the ship ready to leave, Kimmie had managed to grasp the fundamental structure of the language, the basic rules of grammar, and had learned all of the most commonly used words and the most common verbs, and had begun to learn the conjugation of verbs for dealing with various locative and temporal states.  Tarrin figured that in five days, if he taught her from sunrise to sunset, Kimmie would be fluent in both spoken and written Sha'Kar.
	"I've never seen a language where every sentence ends in the verb," Kimmie told him.  "Torian and Sulasian are nothing like this."
	"When did you learn Torian?" he asked.
	"Tarrin, I am Torian," she grinned.  "Remember?"
	"Oh, I forgot," he admitted.  "Sha'Kar is a pretty complicated language, Kimmie."
	"I noticed.  But it's very musical."
	"I know."
	They kept going right until sunset, when the smell of burning coal began to permeate everything, and the two chimney pipes--Donovan called them smokestacks--began to belch forth boiling clouds of black smoke.  They were heating up the boiler, getting the ship ready to start moving.  Keritanima came up on deck with Miranda, and they talked to Donovan for a long moment.  Donovan was the ship's captain as well as the head scientist, so Keritanima was probably telling him when they were going to leave.
	Sapphire landed on his shoulder with a chirp and a little nuzzle, breathing hard.  She and Chopstick and Turnkey had been flying around almost all day, even flew out to the coast of Vendaka for a short time to investigate the thick jungle, and she looked a little tired.  She hadn't done that much heavy flying for a long time.  He chided her softly about wearing herself out and put her in his lap, massaging her back just between her wings, something she very much loved for him to do after she'd been flying a while.  She laid down limply in his lap and allowed him to do whatever he wanted, enjoying the attention immensely.
	Keritanima and Miranda came over to them, the Queen of Wikuna sitting on a rope bale with a flop, not looking very queenly.  She looked a little tense, and he realized that their impending departure was wearing on her.  It didn't take him long to figure out why.  "The sooner we leave, the sooner we get back, Kerri," he told her.  "Rallix is going to be there waiting for you when you get back, you know that."
	"I didn't think I'd miss him this much," she admitted.  "And I'm worried about him.  Is he doing alright?  Are they causing him any problems?  Is he getting the hang of the job I asked him to do?  It's frustrating not being able to be there to help him."
	"Then talk to him.  That always helps me when I miss Jesmind."
	"How?  He's not a Sorcerer, Tarrin."
	"Talk to the priest on the ship and have him contact the Palace.  Have Jervis give Rallix an amulet," he said, holding up his own. "I know Jervis must have a couple of them laying around somewhere.  As long as he has the amulet, you can talk to him.  The magic of the spell comes from your amulet, not from his.  You can use your amulet to talk to anyone with his own amulet.  I've used it to talk to Ariana and Shiika, and they're not Sorcerers either."
	"I didn't know they could do that!" she gasped.  "What a great idea!  I'll go send the message immediately!"  She jumped up, collected her skirts, then literally ran across the deck, seeking out the bear Wikuni that served as the ship's Priest.  No Wikuni ship, not even a prototype like the steamship, sailed without a priest of Kikalli aboard.
	Miranda gave Tarrin a very grateful look. "Thank you for that," she said.  "Kerri's been getting snappy lately."
	"I should have realized she was missing Rallix.  She's a good actress to hide it for so long."
	"She's one of the best actresses in the world," Miranda winked.  "I have to say, you two look very happy.  What have you been up to over here all day?"
	"Teaching 