e'll be the
right age to be leader when the Gerns come and we're going to name him
John, after the John who was the first leader we ever had on Ragnarok."

Her words brought to his mind a question and he thought of what old Dale
Craig, the leader who had preceded Lake, had written:

_We have survived, the generations that the Gerns thought would never be
born. But we must never forget the characteristics that insured that
survival: an unswerving loyalty of every individual to all the others
and the courage to fight, and die if necessary.

In any year, now, the Gerns will come. There will be no one to help us.
Those on Athena are slaves and it is probable that Earth has been
enslaved by now. We will stand or fall alone. But if we of today could
know that the ones who meet the Gerns will still have the courage and
loyalty that made our survival possible, then we would know that the
Gerns are already defeated...._

The era of danger and violence was over for a little while. The younger
generation had grown up during a time of peaceful development of their
environment. It was a peace that the coming of the Gerns would
shatter--but had it softened the courage and loyalty of the younger
generation?

A week later he was given his answer.

He was climbing up the hill that morning, high above the town below,
when he saw the blue of Julia's wool blouse in the distance. She was
sitting up on a hillside, an open book in her lap and her short spear
lying beside her.

He frowned at the sight. The main southward migration of unicorns was
over but there were often lone stragglers who might appear at any time.
He had warned her that someday a unicorn would kill her--but she was
reckless by nature and given to restless moods in which she could not
stand the confinement of the town.

She jerked up her head as he watched, as though at a faint sound, and he
saw the first movement within the trees behind her--a unicorn.

It lunged forward, its stealth abandoned as she heard it, and she came
to her feet in a swift, smooth movement; the spear in her hand and the
book spilling to the ground.

The unicorn's squeal rang out and she whirled to face it, with two
seconds to live. He reached for his bow, knowing his help would come too
late.

She did the only thing possible that might enable her to survive: she
shifted her balance to take advantage of the fact that a human could
jump to one side a little more quickly than a four-footed