Genifer had been a holy terror the first year after their mother’s death on the Night of Rage in ’39. They’d been living with their grandparents, as they had since their father had deserted the family. But with Mom gone things changed. Despairing of Genifer’s avowed intention to dump school and go live on the streets as soon as she was fully legal, Gram had spent a lot of time predicting that Genifer would be the death of her. Gramps had just nodded quietly through the storms, though he had once privately confided to Tom that he thought Genifer was just taking their mother’s death a bit too hard. Gramps didn’t much care for hysteria in the family women. "Genifer has some of her father’s blood." the old man had said. "And blood will tell." But the General had been wrong—not about their parentage, of course, but about its necessary result. Neither Genifer nor Tom had ever shown their father’s blood, remaining unchanged, normal people.