"Choronzon. And he's not a person. He's a ... well, in the Archipelago they call him a god. He knows Maren from way back. And he doesn't like what she's done in Teven."

"What sfe's done?"

"Rene, Maren Ellis isn't a founder — she's the founder." She told him what little she knew about how Teven had come to be colonized. Rene expressed some surprise at learning how old Maren really was — but not as much surprise as Livia would have expected.

"So she's the keeper of the tech locks," he mused. "And she never told us."

"And there lies the problem," said Livia. "Maren Ellis, Choronzon, the Government, the anecliptics, 3340 — none of them are human. Human beings don't control their own destiny anymore. But the question is, could we?"

"You think the locks are the answer? But why? I should have thought the annies, or this Government — "

She shook her head. "Too much goes on that's simply not on a human scale anymore. Humans could never control the distribution of resources in the solar system, for instance — it's too complex a problem. But we should be able to control those things that are on a human scale."

He nodded slowly. "So that's what you're up to."

"What?" she said innocently.

"You want to take the locks away from Maren." She said nothing. Rene laughed quietly. "And that means that everydring you've said since you arrived — about Choron-zon, and 3340 and so on — could be a lie intended to get Maren to give you the locks."

Livia sat forward. "And if it was? Would you tell her?"

"Well, I don't — " Rene was saved from having to answer by a flurry of activity at the edge of the camp. Someone had arrived, it seemed. He stepped down to look and Livia leaped to her feet, thinking it might be Qi-ingi, and jumped down the side of the rubble pile.

Maren Ellis was talking to a man who stood leaning on a fold of sail material. "I don't know what 3340's really up to any more man you do — but I know what it says it's doing," said a familiar voice. "Would that do for a start?"

Livia stopped in her tracks, shocked; Rene bumped into her. Maren Ellis turned and saw her. "Livia, mere you are. This is our agent inside 3340's camp. Livia Ko-daly, meet — "

"Lucius Xavier," she said, holding out her hand for him to shake. "Yes, we've met."

Lucius looked into her eyes uneasily. "How are you?"

She sighed. "Older, and less easily offended. And you?"

"I'm no better a person than the last time we met," he said with a faint smile. "But I've never been your enemy — as I believe I told you once."

"You did," she said, letting go of his hand. "But back then, your authority mattered to me."

His eyes widened, but before he could reply Maren Ellis said, drily, "I'm glad you two know each other. But, can we get back to the matter at hand?"

Xavier sat down near the fire. He made a show of warming his hands over it. "We've all wanted to know what 3340 is doing here," he said. "During my long association with 334O's people, I've never stopped trying to find that out The problem has been that even the Book's people don't know. They follow their roles and are rewarded for it — that's as much as they know.

"But four days ago a vessel for traveling in space arrived in Barrastea." He glanced shrewdly at Livia. "Were you on that?" She shook her head; her little ship had only arrived at the coronal yesterday.

Lucius looked disappointed. "Anyway, this vessel brought some important roles with it, as well as the first person I've seen whom I might consider an actual leader."

"Filament?" said Livia.

"Uh, yes. Yes, that's her — or its — name."

"We need to speak to this Filament," said Maren. "Can you arrange that?"

Lucius looked uncomfortable. "Our resistance doesn't have a very high priority with the Book at the moment," he said delicately.

"Tell her that I'm here," said Livia. "That should get her attention."

"Hang on," said Lucius. "You asked me if I had learned what 3340 is doing here. Didn't you want to hear what I've found out?"

"I'm sorry, Lucius, please continue," said Maren smoothly.

Lucius looked unhappy. "None of this has turned out ... like I expected," he said, glancing at Livia. 'This vessel brought something else with it. It's a ... I don't know what it is. "But they say it's here to turn the sleepers into a god."

"I've seen this place before," said Doran Morss, wondering at the streets and plazas that glowed under sunrise. "That way is the park, isn't it?"

The young woman walking next to him looked surprised. "When were you here? Teven's been locked down — only we have the keys to get in and out."

They were trudging up a leaf-strewn avenue. In the distance dawn light painted open parkland gold. Here and there people stood about in the street. Their silence and air of distraction was disturbing.

"In a sim," he said. "I've been here in a sim."

The woman leading him nodded as if his explanation hadn't actually raised more questions than it answered. She was dazzlingly beautiful, but it was the ridiculous physical perfection of the body-sculpted; that suggested to him that she was from the inner Archipelago, where such things were currently fashionable. Judging from the clunky way she walked, she had once been short and stocky, and had never quite adjusted to the tall willowy build she had now.

She was one of 3340's advance guard in this place, and might have been here for years by now. She probably had no idea what was going on in the outside world.

Doran's kidnapping had been remarkably polite — after his beating at the hands of Filament's thugs, that is. There was little need for violence once he was on board her ship. He could escape into any Archipelagic view he wanted, it wouldn't change the underlying situation. And there was nothing and no one for him to fight; any adversary would dissolve into inscape if Doran so much as glared at him or her.

But he had finally been allowed to disembark from the ship, only to find himself in a place he'd thought existed only in an online fantasy. It didn't matter. Now that he was dealing with real people again, things were different He might be able to actually do something here.

Suddenly the woman dropped back to walk beside him. "That sim — the one where you visited here — who made it?"

Doran chewed his lip for a moment, thinking. Then he said, "A local named Livia Kodaly. One of yours, I assume. I suppose she was part of a propaganda mission of some kind? To interest users of the Book in coming here?"

"Maybe." She shrugged. "The Book's strategic moves often aren't visible to us on our scale. It's probably got millions of projects on the go."

She walked on, serenely confident. Doran sized her up, debating whether he could knock her down and just run for it. Probably not — he could see the faint shimmering outline of a virtual matter shield around her, what the locals called an "angel." He couldn't disable her.

On the other hand, Filament needed him alive and cooperative. And, cooped up as he'd been for the past days, he hadn't had any exercise.

So, as they were passing a narrow alley, he simply turned and ran. It took her a full five seconds to notice what he'd done; her startled shout made him laugh out loud as he dodged and jumped the debris in the alley.

He came out onto a street that he'd never visited in the sim, and quickly looked left and right. She'd catch him any second now — or call in the reinforcements mat he had no doubt were lurking around somewhere nearby. So it didn't matter which way he went; might as well pick the most scenic. He went left.

Her pounding feet sounded behind him. Again she shouted for him to stop. Doran kept running, reveling in the feeling of the crisp autumn air in his lungs and the pounding of his feet on pavement. For a few seconds it didn't matter where he was or what this was all about. There was just him enjoying the run.