Wizard

"If you're trying to cheer me up... ." But it did have some effect. Her first estimate of sixty-eight minutes was right, it turned out. But her figure for terminal velocity was low; she would be falling longer. She wondered what the angel could do to help her with that.

"It's true I can't carry you," he said. "Really, you amaze me. I get all sorts of reactions from people. Mostly they tell me what I have to do, when they're rational at all."

"I'm rational. Now can we get on with it? Time must be a factor here."

"But it's not, you know. I mean, not yet. I can help you only when we get closer to the ground, and what I'll do is slow you down. Until then you might as well relax. But I guess I don't have to tell you that."

Robin didn't know what to say to him. She was on the edge of hysteria, and her defenses against it were weakening. The only way to deal with that, she had found, was to pretend you are calm. If you can pretend well enough to fool someone else, you might even fool yourself

He was falling in front of her now. As she looked at him, two things occurred to her: he was one of perhaps five people she had ever met smaller than herself, and she had no reason to assume he was a male. She wondered why she had done so. He had no external genitalia; there was nothing but a patch of iridescent green feathers between his legs. It must have been his wiriness. In her short time in Gaea she had come to associate angularity with males. He seemed to be made of bones and cables, covered with equal amounts of bare brown skin and multicolored feathers.

"Are you a child?" she asked.

"No. Are you?" He gri

"I have never made love at all in the sense you probably mean."

"You want to try? We have about fifteen minutes, and I can guarantee you an experience you won't forget. How about it?"

"No. I can't imagine why you would want to."

"I'm a deviant," he said cheerfully. "I have this thing for fat. Can't seem to get enough of it. I hang around waiting for fat human women to drop by. I do them a favor, and they do me a favor. Everybody's happy."

"Is that your fee then?"

"No. Not a fee. I'll save you anyway. I don't like to see people squashed to death. But what do you say? It's not so much to ask. Just about everybody's been eager to return the favor."

"I'm not."

"You're odd, you know? I've never seen a human with markings like you. Were you born with those? Are you a different species of human? I can't understand why you won't make love with me. It's over so quickly. All it takes is a minute. Is that so much to ask?"

"You ask a lot of questions."

"I just want to ... oops! It's about time to start turning, or you're going to hit ... watch out!"

Robin had turned in panic, imagining the ground almost upon her. Her shoulder caught the rushing winds the wrong way, and she began to tumble.

"Just go limp again," the angel advised. "You'll straighten out. That's better. Now see if you can twist around. Keep your arms out to your sides, and angle them back."

Robin did as he said, ending in a swan dive. They were passing through the twilight zone now, close enough that the land below her was moving visibly. The angel moved in behind her and encircled her with his arms. They were hard and strong as ropes, one crossing her breasts, the other over her loins. She felt the cool pressure of his cheek feathers against her neck, then the warmth of his lips on her earlobe.

"You're so soft, so much lovely padding... ."

"By the Great Mother, if you are going to rape me, do it now, and a curse be on you for a lying peacock! We haven't got all day." Robin was shivering, fear of falling and the threat of nausea combining to batter at her self-control.

"What's in the bag?" he said tersely.

"My demon."

"All right, don't answer! But hold onto it. Here we go."

His arms were like clamps now as he carefully began to open his great wings. Weight tugged at her, changing her free fall to the feeling of hanging upside down. It became impossible to keep her legs straight out behind her. When she let them drop, the unstable pair rocked briefly around the balance point of the angel's wings, below his shoulder blades.

The ground tilted as the angel banked cautiously. His goal was to head her toward Ophion, where it flowed beneath the cable joining the Place of Winds to the hub. The river was deep, wide, and slow in that country, ru

They passed over a group of craters. Robin didn't ask what they were. It couldn't have been people; ninety meters per second would not give them that much kinetic energy. But other, heavier objects released at her point of departure could have done it.

The angel extended his wings to the fullest now. The ground below was hilly and forested, but ahead, the straight stretch of river could be seen. It did not look as if they would reach it, and there could be no pulling up and going around. The angel could lift little more than his own body weight.

"I think I'll have you down to seventy or eighty kilometers per hour when you hit," he said, shouting in her ear. "I will try to brake us in short bursts when I'm sure you'll reach the river. You'll be coming in at an angle."

"I can't swim."

"Neither can I. You're on your own there."

It was a confusing experience. The tug of his arms increased sharply, and she took a deep breath, her heart hammering. Then they were gliding again, seemingly still high above the brown waters. Another tug; she put her hands out reflexively, but they were still airborne. The third tug was the hardest of all. For long seconds Robin could not draw a breath.

And now the shoreline was getting closer, streaking by on her right. Ahead, the river curved westward.

She thought she hit on her back but was too stu

Swimming turned out to be strenuous. It was amazing the things one could do when the water rose over one's upper lip.

The angel stood on the shore as she clambered out. It was not something he did well; his feet were not built for it. They were clawlike, with long, skeletal toes, made for grasping tree limbs. Robin crawled a meter or two on dry land, then went over on her side.

"Here, give me that," the angel said, yanking the bag from her hand. "I deserve something for my work; you can't argue with that." He opened it, gasped, closed it quickly, and let it fall, backing away.

"I told you," Robin wheezed.

The angel was angry and impatient. "Well, what have you got?"

"There's a little money. You can have it all."

"I have no use for it. The only place to spend it is at the Titanides' madhouse."

Robin sat up and used her fingers to comb wet hair from her face.

"You speak English well," she said.

"What do you know? It can say nice things if it wants to."

"I'm sorry. If I hurt your feelings, I didn't really mean to. I just had a lot to worry about."

"Not anymore."

"I appreciate that. You saved my life, and I'm grateful."

"All right, all right. I learned to speak English from my grandmother, incidentally. She also taught me that nothing comes for free. What do you have besides money?"