Changelings by Anne McCaffrey Page A

bother. How big were they and did the foil have writing on it? We can read that sort of thing now, you know.”
    “Ah well, I guess they were about as big as . . .” He reached into the pockets on the thighs of his pants and pulled out two packets bright as fish. “And the writing says—this one says, ‘for Murel,’ and this one says, ‘for Ronan.’ ”
    The twins snatched them and Ronan began trying to open his. Murel looked up at Johnny’s grin and said, “Thank you very much, Johnny, for bringing them. But Deirdre Angalook is quite right. You’re a terrible tease.”
    “Deirdre said something to you about me, did she?”
    “Aye,” Murel said, pretending to scratch her own chin. “But I can’t quite recall what else it was she said except for the bit about the teasing.”
    Johnny stabbed a finger to her middle as if to tickle her, but at that moment Ronan figured out the packet and it unfolded, flowerlike, blooming into a metallic-looking suit with what seemed to be very light quilting.
    “It’s very small and thin,” Ronan said, a little disappointed as he felt the cloth.
    “Oh, there’s directions,” Johnny said. “It gets bigger and puffier, I’m told.”
    “How’s that?” Ronan asked.
    “See there, that fine print? It says, ‘Just add water.’ ”
    Both of them jumped him and there was a lot of rolling in the snow before he finally admitted defeat and said he had to go report in to their parents.
    “You two coming along?”
    “No,” Ronan said. “We need to try these on, test them. So we can show our folks.”

CHAPTER 5
    W HEN J OHNNY HAD gone, the twins headed directly to the river. It connected the former Space Base with the village. In the winter, its frozen surface served as a road where people drove dogs and snocles back and forth from their ice fishing holes or to go after water.
    Ronan compressed his suit again and returned it to packet form, then began removing his snowsuit.
    “You’re not supposed to take off your clothes where there are people around, or change either!” his sister chided him.
    “Well, we have to test them.”
    “We can go to the spring. And besides, we need to find ’Nook and Co’ first anyway.”
    “No we don’t. With these suits, we don’t have to worry about getting caught without our clothes anywhere, and that’s all the cats really do. Otherwise they just hang around the water hole. I want to test these, Murel. Let’s go somewhere fun. Maybe we can find a new chaperone.”
    “Da said—”
    “Didn’t you see that load of offworlders? Da will be busy processing and orienting them for days and days. If we can find someone Mum and he like to swim with us, we can go
everywhere.
We won’t have to hang around boring old Kilcoole with our skins itching for wet while Mum and Da entertain strangers.”
    Murel was not above temptation. She wanted to see what was beyond Kilcoole and the familiar waters too. And she knew what Ronan said was true. It seemed like with their parents, what everybody else wanted always came before what they wanted—or even needed. It was very unfair. If they could be a little more independent, or at least not have to wait on their folks or those land-bound cats, maybe they could even help with the work Mum and Da did for Petaybee. After all, they were eight now. That was pretty old.
    “Okay,” she said. “But not here. That place where they put in the fish wheel in the summer. Nobody is there now and we can strip off and plunge in without getting caught.”
    They raced through town without drawing much attention since everyone was busy meeting and greeting the new people. Even though a lot of Petaybeans didn’t want the offworlders there, Clodagh and the other leaders reminded folk that they had all been from elsewhere originally and these people, like themselves, were just looking for a home to settle down in. Petaybee would either accept or reject them before long. No need meanwhile for Petaybeans to be