"I hope it didn't get broken." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of something sinewy; he had strung the shells on lengths of leather thong. There were three loops of leather, each longer than the one before, and the shells were spread apart and held in place by tiny knots. "Geryn gave me the thong, and I put it together this afternoon. It's a necklace, see?"
She turned while he tied the ends behind her neck. Then she turned back to him, touching the green brilliance of one frail cornucopia, passing to the muted orange of another along the brown leather band. "Thank you," she said. "Thank you very much, Tel."
"You want some fruit?" he said, picking up the globe and beginning to peel the rest of it.
"All right," she said. He broke it open, gave her half, and they went to the edge of the roof and leaned on the balustrade, looking to the street below, then over the roofs of the other houses of the Devil's Pot and up to the darkening towers.
"You know," Tel said. "I've got a problem."
"No identification papers, no place to go. I should say you do."
"Not like that," he said. "But that's part of it, I guess. I guess it's a large part of it. But not all."
"Then what is it?"
"I've got to figure out what I want. Here I am, in a new place, with no way to get anything for myself; I've got to figure a goal."
"Look," said Alter, assuming the superiority of age and urban training, "I'm a year older than you, and I don't know where I'm going yet. But when I was your age, it occurred to me it would probably all take care of itself. All I had to do was ride it out. So that's what I've been doing, and I haven't been too unhappy. Maybe it's the difference between living here or on the seashore. But here you've got to spend a lot of time looking for the next meal. At least people like you and me have to. If you pay attention to that, you'll find yourself heading in the right direction soon enough. Whatever you're going to be, you're going to be, if you just give yourself half a chance."