ou will look
like our masters. You will share in their work. And there may be times
when you will find favor in their eyes. Then you may learn of love.

"Love," the old voice was soft in Copper's ears. "The word is almost a
stranger to us now, known only to the few who serve our masters. It was
not always so. The Old Ones knew love before Man Alexander came. And
our young were the fruit of love rather than the product of our masters'
cunning. But you may know the flower even though you cannot bear its
fruit. You may enter that world of pleasure-pain the Old Ones knew, that
world which is now denied us.

"But remember always that you are a Lani. A man may be kind to you. He
may treat you gently. He may show you love. Yet you never will be his
equal. Nor must you become too attached to him, for you are not human.
You are not his natural mate. You cannot bear his young. You cannot
completely share. You can only accept.

"So if love should come to you, take it and enjoy it, but do not try to
possess it. For there lies heartache rather than happiness. And it is
a world of heartache, my little one, to long for something which you
cannot have."

To long for something which one cannot have! Copper knew that feeling.
It had been with her ever since Kennon had come into her life that
night a year ago. And it had grown until it had become gigantic. He
was kind--yes. He was harsh--occasionally. Yet he had shown her no more
affection than he would have shown a dog. Less--for he would have petted
a dog and he did not touch her.

He laughed, but she was not a part of his laughter. He needed her, but
the need was that of a builder for a tool. He liked her and sometimes
shared his problems and triumphs with her, and sometimes his defeats,
but he did not love. There had never been for her the bright fierce look
he had bent upon the Woman Eloise those times when she had come to him,
the look men gave to those who found favor in their eyes.

Had he looked at her but once with that expression she would have come
to him though fire barred the way. The Woman Eloise was a fool.

Copper looked at him across the corner of the desk, the yellow hair, the
bronze skin, firm chin, soft lips and long straight nose, the
narrowed eyes, hooded beneath thick brows, scanning the papers in his
lean-tendoned hands. His nearness was an ache in her body--yet he was
far away.

She thought of how his hands would feel upon her. He had touched her
once,