It was not a boast; it was a statement of fact, a realization that there was only one Kortha.
Xax looked around him and saw the tire marks in the sand. He sat silent, looking up at the man who towered more than six feet above him.
"Someone was here," Xax said at last. "Ilse, wasn't it? You've told me enough of her! The Confederacy needs you, doesn't it? And you won't go."
"I go to Yassa."
"Mad. Mad!"
"Not mad, Xax. So sane that I go to the one spot on Mars where I might bring her freedom, and a place in the planetary sun."
Xax digested that, squatting there.
At last he said, "You have not dwelt out here three years for nothing. You tried to hide from yourself at first, but you have learned things here on the desert."
A pain tugged and tore at Kortha's heart, and his lips were bitter as they smiled.
"You are clever, Xax. Smarter than Ilse."