The Rowan

However, no sooner was the Rowan back in the Tower, Jeran in a carrier by her couch, than Reidinger sent for Jeff.

"That's mean!" the Rowan complained, pacing up and down. "Your son needs your presence. I need your presence. I don't care what Elizara said, he's got no right to break up our family unit." "Sweetheart, we don't know that that's his intention," Jeff replied.

She caught his not quite suppressed thought. "You! You like whizzing about, oozing charm over everyone! Traipsing about the galaxy like a… a…" "Trapeze artist?" Jeff suggested mildly, not the least bit ashamed of his inclinations. "And you can't fool me that you like someone else, even me, managing your Tower."

"Callisto is your bailiwick: it works more efficiently with your mindset than anyone else's." She eyed him. "Now, wait a minute, Jeff Raven, don't try those tactics on me!" "The last person in the world I can fool," and he held out his arms to her. We don't stay angry with each other, love.

We know each other far too well. He fitted his body to hers, her head under his chin and reassured her with every fiber of his being.

"Besides, I'm curious as to what Reidinger has in mind for me now. I've been everywhere else and even I know that Central Worlds isn't planning to install a new Tower any time soon." Faced with the inevitable, she lifted his capsule and thrust it efficiently toward Earth and, with a sigh, went back to work.

Jeff was absolutely correct about Callisto being her Tower. Being Altairian Prime had been a subtle victory and she had enjoyed working with old friends, and using her new awareness to facilitate a blending of the Talent required to operate such a major way point. But Callisto was hers, her home, where she had met and loved Jeff, and where their son had been born. The Tower personnel were an integrated team that had survived all her early foolishness and she now realized they had become the family she had lost. Afra was more younger brother than colleague. He honestly found Jeran an enchanting child which only reinforced her good opinion of him.

Live stuff coming in, Afra's thought broke through her musing and instantly she caught the large personnel carrier as it arced up from Earth Prime.

Hi, honey, and Jeff's mind, the initiating kinetic, met hers.

Breeding animals for Deneb! We got a bonus: maternity and paternity.

FT amp;T policy, so don't raise your hackles. I just blew all mine to restock the farm. I'll be home tonight.

She could hear that he had something of momentous proportions to tell her. It was a long day for her, part of it waiting, part of it attending to Jeran's needs, but most of it wondering what sort of an assignment Reidinger was now laying on Jeff. She'd be willing even to leave Callisto but she had to be with Jeff.

You will be, love! His quick thought answered her. His mind resounded with elation.

The Rowan was nursing Jeran when Jeff arrived back so surreptitiously that she didn't hear him until she felt his presence behind her. Jeran let out a frightened squeak.

Then Jeff opened up the blaze of his exultation and his son's eyes grew as round as his mother's as the import of Jeff's news clarified.

"Earth Prime!" "Shhh! Everyone'll hear you," Jeff said, sliding on to the bed beside her and kissing her neck.

"You mean, everyone'll hear you!" Then she absorbed the implications. "Earth Prime? Reidinger's Earth Prime." Sadness tinged Jeff's face and mind. "Mother caught it from Elizara. We were too involved with Jeran here to notice. Did you realize that Reidinger is old?" "Oh!" Jeff nodded. "Precisely!" And he opened his mind to all that had occurred during that momentous interview in Reidinger's spacious hidden office in the FT amp;T Cube.

How desperately Reidinger yearned to retire and enjoy a few years free of the stresses of such high position: a desire made more urgent after Siglen's demise for Reidinger was very much aware that his mind faltered from time to time out of sheer fatigue and the debilities of his advanced age.

Yet he could not relinquish command to an unsuitable personality. It would have been me? The Rowan said, shrinking from the very notion of such onerous responsibility. Patently Jeff regarded it as a magnificent challenge.

Sorry to do you out of it, love… He grinned, knowing the depths of her relief. Idly he reached out to let Jeran's fist curl around his fingers, his expression dotingly tender for an omnipotent Prime-elect. Up until my call for help, you were being subtly groomed for the job. David certainly wasn't capable, much less Capella. When I think what I can now do for Deneb.

"For Deneb?" the Rowan echoed, startled. Then she began to laugh, loving him more devotedly than ever for that altruistic consideration.

Small wonder he had become Reidinger's choice.

Jeff nodded, his brilliant blue eyes twinkling with delight in her appreciation. It simply isn't on for Earth Prime's native world to be second-rate, now is it?

You demanded a Denebian Tower as a condition?

Lover, and Jeff stretched out on the bed, punched a pillow comfortably behind his head, I could have demanded the moons of the solar system on a diamond chain and had them. As you well understand, Central Worlds has to have the best Talent as its Prime. His grin was particularly arch. I don't think I was greedy or particularly difficult. But Deneb will have a Tower. You cobbled together the basic facilities: we'll improve them and send in teachers and assessors.