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blowing. It would turn hot by noon.
    T H E S H I P I N B O U N D was the Southern Cross, Constellation class, Earth origin. That meant weapons, which meant enforcement, which sometimes meant a political presence that outranked a sys-

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    tem governor. Routine ship-calls from that distant source arrived only once a year. And their current year was far from up.
    Setha Reaux, who was system governor, consulted his records, anxiously searching for something regarding that ship, its recent business, and its possible reason for showing up all the way to Concord, to this most sensitive post outside Earth itself . . . where, if a ship arrived, it was not just passing through.
    The Outsider Council was clearly tracking that arrival. Reaux had a call from Antonio Brazis, Chairman of that body and director of Planetary Observations.
    The resident ondat official, Kekellen, had likewise noticed it, and sent one of his or her enigmatic queries, which had gone to technical committee for analysis, and a careful answer.
    Setha Reaux, consequently, had spent last night in the office. He had a call from his wife backed up among the queries from various departments right now. He had postponed dealing with it, as one more straw on his back, likely the breaking point. He’d made over ten drafts of a message to that inbound ship, but, unable to find the right words, had sent nothing to it as yet. Now he feared his failure to salute that ship at first sight might in itself be seen as arrogance or cowardice, and he increasingly believed he had to do something.
    A massive globe-garden sat cradled in the corner of the office.
    Most such globes were small, islands of pure Earth genes, a few algaes, a little wisp of life. Add a moving creature, and complexity increased. Add light and warmth, and life carried on, microcosms of Earth’s evolution, from salt seas to life on land. His globe, imported at great cost from Earth itself, involved anoles, quick, flitting creatures that fed and mated, birthed and died and fed the plants that fed the creatures that fed them.
    Concord Station itself was such a bubble, not as successfully self-contained. They had governments that came from the outside and, if not carefully managed, fed on Concord itself.
    He drafted another message. He stripped it to the bare, necessary bones: Setha Reaux, Governor of Concord System, to the captain of arriving ship Southern Cross:
    Welcome. We look forward to receiving you, and hope that this visit will be enjoyable.
    There. Less was more. No speculation, no apology for delay, just Fo r g e o f H e a v e n • 2 7
    general good wishes, his willingness to cooperate, his total blithe innocence of threat . . . or the fact he should have said something eight hours ago.
    And he was innocent of wrongdoing, damn it, except a few questionable items some real stickler for accounting might fault, if an audit started looking for excuses. There were the sports arena solicitations, but they were entirely legal—he was sure they were legal, and he and the board had made peace last year.
    Nothing that piddling small could have brought an Earth ship out here.
    Promotions came out of such unscheduled visits, but his governorship was already the highest rank a man could attain. Some as-pirant in some lower post, but with high connections, might, on the other hand, get a promotion upstairs, to his doorstep—Reaux’s perpetual nightmare: that the urgent need to move somebody’s nephew out of a sensitive spot, reasonable enough at the other end of the telescope, could eventually get said nephew promoted upstairs to trouble his life—or even to replace him, since his political connections had been in the prior, more reasonable administration.
    Never say absolutely it couldn’t happen. Governments did incredibly stupid things at long distance, and this one had certainly done its share, but his displacement was unlikely. The fact that Concord was the most sensitive spot in