d, a natural
enough attitude in view of experiences of the past. However, they
had enough old Federation-period textbooks still in microprint to
know what could be done with gadolinium. They decided to write off
the past as fair fight and no bad blood, and start over again.

It would be some years before either planet had hyperships of their
own. In the meantime, both were good customers, and rapidly becoming
good friends. A number of young Amaterasuans and Beowulfers had come
to Tanith to study various technologies.

The Tanith locals were studying, too. In the first year, Trask
had gathered the more intelligent boys of ten to twelve from each
community and begun teaching them. In the past year, he had sent
the most intelligent of them off to Gram to school. In another
five years, they'd be coming home to teach; in the meantime, he
was bringing teachers to Tanith from Gram. There was a school
at Tradetown, and others in some of the larger villages, and
at Rivington there was something that could almost be called a
college. In another ten years or so, Tanith would be able to
pretend to the status of civilization.

* * * * *

If only Andray Dunnan and his ships didn't come too soon. They would
be beaten off, he was confident of that; but the damage Tanith would
take, in the defense, would set back his work for years. He knew all
too well what Space Viking ships could do to a planet. He'd have to
find Dunnan's base, smash it, destroy his ships, kill the man
himself, first. Not to avenge that murder six years ago on Gram;
that was long ago and far away, and Elaine was vanished, and so was
the Lucas Trask who had loved and lost her. What mattered now was
planting and nurturing civilization on Tanith.

But where would he find Dunnan, in two hundred billion cubic
light-years? Dunnan had no such problem. He knew where his enemy was.

And Dunnan was gathering strength. The _Yo-Yo_, Captain Vann
Humfort; she had been reported twice, once in company with the
_Starhopper_, and once with the _Enterprise_. She bore a blazon of
a feminine hand dangling a planet by a string from one finger; a
good ship, and an able, ruthless captain. The _Bolide_; she and the
_Enterprise_ had made a raid on Ithunn. The Gilgameshers had settled
there and one of their ships had brought that story in.

And he recruited two ships at once on Melkarth, and there was a good
deal of mirth about that among the Tanith Spa