He might have known. If there had been one chance in the odd billion of his making any such discovery, the Lhari would never have given Vorongil permission for the intruder to visit the planet at all. He would have been returned to the _Swiftwing_ as he had been taken from it, by closed car, and imprisoned, maybe even drugged, until he was safely back in the human worlds again. He was under parole not to enter the drive chamber (and sure he would be stopped if he attempted it anyhow), but when Acceleration One was completed, he went to the viewport in the Recreation Lounge, and nobody threw him out. He stood long, looking at the unfamiliar galaxy of the Lhari stars; the unknown, forever unknowable constellations with their strange shapes. Stars green, gold, topaz, burning blue, sullen red, and the great strangely colored receding sun of the Lhari people, known to them by the melodious name of the Ke Lhiro--which meant, simply, _The Sun_: it was their first home. Where had he seen that color? In that stolen glimpse of the Lhari ship landing, long ago? Of all the colors of space, this one he would never know. He turned away from the unsolvable riddle of the strange constellations; and went to his cabin, to dream of the green star Meristem where he had first plotted known coordinates for a previously unknown world, and to wander in baffling nightmares where he fed jagged, star-colored pieces of hail into the ship's computer and watched them come out as tiny paperdoll spaceships with the letterhead of Eight Colors printed neatly across their sides. After the warp-drive shift, Vorongil came to his cabin, this time crisp and businesslike. "We're back in your galaxy," he said, "among the stars you know. We have no passenger space on the _Swiftwing_; we had to ship out without replacing Rugel, which means we're short two men. I've no authority to ask this of you, but--would you like your old job back for the rest of the voyage?" Bart glanced at his human hands. Vorongil shrugged. "We've carried Mentorians as full-ranking Astrogators. There don't happen to be any on the _Swiftwing_. But there's no law about it." Bart looked the old Lhari in the eye. "I won't accept Mentorian terms, Vorongil." "I wouldn't ask it. You worked your way outward on this run, and the High Council didn't see fit to erase those memories or inhibit them. Why should I? Do you want it or not?" Did he want it? Until this moment Bart had not identified the worst of his pain and defeat--to travel as a passenger, a supercargo, when he had once been part of the _Swiftwing_. Literally he ached to be back with it again. "I do, _rieko mori_." "Very well," Vorongil rapped, "see that you turn out next watch!" He spun round and walked out. His tone was no longer gently indulgent, but sharp and distant. Bart, at first surprised, suddenly understood. Not now a prisoner, a passenger, a guest on the _Swiftwing_. He was part of the crew again--and Vorongil was his captain.