Patience laughed with her.

"So, what do you want to know?"

"The Tassaliki. They're believers, I know, but what does that mean in practical terms? What might offend Prekeptor?"

"Well, don't make jokes about taking a tumble behind the statue of the Starship Captain."

"They don't think he was the Kristos, do they?"

"They're Watchers, not Rememberers. They don't think

Kristos has ever come to Imakulata, but they watch every day for him to come."

"Vigilants?"

"God protect us from Vigilants. But yes, almost. more organized, of course. They do believe in warfare, for one thing. As a sacrament. I do protocols, you know, not theology."

"Warn me of whatever I need to be warned of."

"Then stop pumping."

Patience stopped pumping air, and lay supine before the severed head in order to read its lips and catch the scraps of sound that an unbreathing mouth can produce.

"You are in grave danger. They believe the seventh seventh seventh daughter will bring Kristos."

Patience wasn't sure whether she had heard correctly.

The phrase meant nothing to her. She let her face show her puzzlement.

"No one told you?" asked Letheko. "God help you, child. An ancient prophecy-some say as old as the Starship Captain-says that the seventh seventh seventh daughter will save the world. Or destroy it. The prophecy is vague."

Seventh seventh seventh daughter. What in the world did that mean?

"Seven times seven times seven generations since the Starship Captain. Irena was first. You are the 343rd Heptarch."

Patience covered Letheko's lips with her fingers, to keep her even from mouthing such treason.

Letheko smiled in vast amusement. "What do you think they can do to me, cut off my head?"

But Patience was no fool. She knew that heads could be tortured more cruelly and with less effort than would ever be possible with a living human being.