"It's worse than that," the ship confided quietly. "He's all but a prisoner here. He doesn't want to be aboard, he wants to be a priest.
    We started out to be such wonderful friends, and now I think they are making him hate me."
    "No one could hate you," Althea assured her, and tried to make her words sound confident. "He does want to be somewhere else; there's no use in my lying to you about that. So what he hates is not being where he wants to be. He couldn't possibly hate you." Steeling herself, as if she plunged her hand into fire, she added, "You can be his strength, you know. Let him know how much you value him, and what a comfort it is to you that he is aboard. As you once did for me." Try as she might, she could not keep her voice from breaking on the last words.
    "But I am a ship, not your child," Vivacia replied to Althea's unvoiced thought rather than her words. "You are not giving up a little child with no knowledge of the world. I know in many ways I am naive still, but I have a wealth of memories and information to draw on. I just need to put them in some sort of order, and see how they relate to who I am now. I know you, Althea. I know you did not abandon me by choice. But you also know me. And you must understand how deeply it hurts me when Wintrow is forced to be aboard me, forced to be my companion and heart's friend when he wishes he were elsewhere. We are drawn to one another, Wintrow and I. But his anger at the situation makes him resist that bond. And it makes me ashamed that I so often reach toward him."
    The division within the ship's heart was terrible to feel. Vivacia battled her own need for Wintrow's companionship, forcing herself to stand still in a cold isolation that was gray as fog. Almost Althea could sense it as a terrible place, rain swept and chill and endlessly gray. It appalled her. As Althea searched for comforting words, a man's voice rang out loud and commanding over the ordinary dock yells and thuds. "You. You there! Get away from the ship! Captain's orders, you aren't to come aboard her."
    Althea tipped her head back, shielding her eyes against the sun's glare. She stared up at Torg as if she had not recognized his voice. "This, sir, is a public dock," she pointed out calmly.
    "Well, this ain't a public ship. So shove off!"