a low branch, and found himself chirping in
delight.

The tree extruded a feeler from the branch he sat on, and touched his
wings and tail.

"Interesting," said the tree. "I'll have to try that shape some time."

Ilg.

"Traitor," hissed Pid, growing a mouth in his chest to hiss it, and
then he did something that caused Ilg to exclaim in outrage.

Pid flew out of the woods. Over the underbrush and across the open
space toward the gate.

This body would do the trick!

This body would do anything!

He rose, in a matter of a few Sparrow heartbeats, to an altitude of a
hundred feet. From here the gate, the Men, the building were small,
sharp shapes against a green-brown mat. Pid found that he could see
not only with unaccustomed clarity, but with a range of vision that
astonished him. To right and to left he could see far into the hazy
blue of the sky, and the higher he rose the farther he could see.

He rose higher.

The Displacer pulsed, reminding him of the job he had to do.

* * * * *

He stiffened his wings and glided, regretfully putting aside his
desires to experiment with this wonderful shape, at least for the
present. After he planted the Displacer, he would go off by himself
for a while and do it just a little more--somewhere where Ilg and Ger
would not see him--before the Grom Army arrived and the invasion
began.

He felt a tiny twinge of guilt, as he circled. It was Evil to want to
keep this alien flying shape any longer than was absolutely necessary
to the performance of his duty. It was a device of the Shapeless One--

But what had Ilg said? _All Grom are born Shapeless._ It was true.
Grom children were amorphous, until old enough to be instructed in the
caste-shape of their ancestors.

Maybe it wasn't _too_ great a sin to alter your Shape, then--just once
in a long while. After all, one must be fully aware of the nature of
Evil in order to meaningfully reject it.

He had fallen lower in circling. The Displacer pulse had strengthened.
For some reason it irritated him. He drove higher on strong wings,
circled again. Air rushed past him--a smooth, whispering flow, pierced
by his beak, streaming invisibly past his sharp eyes, moving along his
body in tiny turbulences that moved his feathers against his skin.

It occurred to him--or rather struck him with considerable force--that
he was satisfying a longing of his Pilot Caste that went far deeper
than Piloting.