The souls began to glide up out of dying bodies; ephemeral spectres taking on the idealized form of the corpse they had just departed. No longer old and frail, bloated or withered. These were themselves as they best remembered, young and vibrant. Delight radiated outwards as they slipped fluidly through the growing flames and tendrils of smoke. Phantom hands were raised in farewell to those they once loved. In response, the cheering and shouts of encouragement from the shore grew ever louder.

The flames engulfing the flotilla of boats rose higher, becoming bright enough to be refracted from the vast crystalline sheets hanging above the river. More and more souls ascended into the Skylord, absorbed into its translucent mass, where they could journey safely – though Slvasta was sure he perceived several slip off the surface of the crystal, those the Skylord didn’t consider worthy. The unfulfilled – tragic souls whose lives had left them bitter or broken. They were left behind to make their own way across space to the Giu nebula, which was the entrance to the Heart of the Void.

Even so, he joined the cheering, applauding wildly as the souls streamed into the Skylord. So many were going; so many had reached fulfilment. He was genuinely proud of a world that provided so much opportunity despite the constant adversity of the Fallers.

Then the Skylord was moving on, slipping across Varlan’s rooftops towards the next city. Slvasta looked upwards as the massive bulk glided smoothly through the air above him. Weird bands of coloured light played across his face, and the air swirled energetically. There was a part of him that wanted to join the Skylord there and then, to be taken away to the Heart, circumventing the difficulties he knew he was going to face during his mortal life. His hand came up and saluted the alien angel. He wasn’t surprised to see tears glinting in Lanicia’s eyes, while sadness and longing oozed from her mind. She caught him looking and gave a modest little shrug as she hardened up her shell.

They ate a lunch of pasta and fish while the abandoned boats on the Colbal burnt in spectacular style, thousands of flaming hulls drifting downstream, pumping out clouds of lively sparks which swirled and twirled above the choppy water. The current was strong enough to carry them past the city boundary, and the river wide enough so they never came too close to the banks. By mid-afternoon the last flames had expired in puffs of dirty steam as one by one the scorched hulls were swallowed by the water.

They were just finishing dessert, a heavy walnut sponge coated in thick toffee syrup, when a batch of Arnice’s friends came in. Slvasta didn’t even have to use his ex-sight to see who was making their way up the club’s broad stairs. He heard them a long time before they reached the restaurant. Their braying voices carried through the club, full of sneering and self-confidence. Slvasta never did understand how someone as basically decent as Arnice could ever talk with such people, let alone actively seek out their company.

The three of them blundered into the restaurant and, as one, yelled greetings to Arnice, sauntering over, stealing spare chairs from other tables. Their breath smelt of narnik smoke and whisky.

Slvasta stayed for a tactful five minutes, then excused himself. Arnice barely noticed. As he headed down the stairs, Slvasta saw with some dismay that Jaix was laughing heartily at the anecdotes of the youthful aristocrats. She would make Arnice an excellent bride, he thought.

‘Are you really going?’ Lanicia ’pathed him.

‘Yes, ’fraid so.’

‘Wait.’ She appeared at the top of the stairs and hurried down towards him. ‘You weren’t going to leave me with them, were you? What kind of officer and gentleman does that?’

He grinned. ‘Sorry.’

‘Sometimes I wonder how we ever survive the Fallers. I thank Giu we still have men like you, to protect us.’

‘We all play our part.’

‘Ha.’ She rolled her eyes and made a remarkably obscene gesture towards the floor above. ‘They don’t.’

Slvasta began to re-evaluate Lanicia in an altogether more favourable light – and realized he was staring at her divine face again. ‘There are always ways round people like that.’

‘So what party are you going to tonight?’ she asked as they walked across the entrance hall.

‘I won’t be. I have some work to do. It’s a good time to catch up.’

‘Oh, Slvasta, that’s terrible. Everybody parties the night a Skylord arrives, from the stevedores up to the Captain himself. We deserve it. Don’t you think?’

‘It would be nice, but, like I said, someone has to remain vigilant.’

They reached the door, and the concierge clicked his fingers, calling a carriage from the waiting rank.

‘I will be attending the Kayllian family party tonight,’ she said as the carriage pulled by a black terrestrial horse drew up beside them. ‘But until then I shall probably take to my bed to rest. I keep a day villa on Fortland Street. Would you care to escort me there, captain?’

Given his pause could only have lasted a second, Slvasta was impressed with himself for just how many thoughts for and against ran through his mind. ‘I would be delighted at such a duty.’

*

As always, Slvasta woke at six o’clock, just before his alarm clock was set of go off. His teekay reached out and flicked the little toggle on the top of the clock so it wouldn’t ring the hemispherical copper bells. He was glad to find it there beside the bed; indeed he was glad to find he was in his own lodgings, for he couldn’t really recall much about travelling back here last night. He’d certainly taken a cab from Fortland Street, but he’d kept dozing off during the ride home. An afternoon in Lanicia’s bed was as exhausting as a week of Faller combat exercises. She’d been very keen to explore the potential for wickedness his strong teekay could accomplish, casting off her shell as fast as she did her clothes. And his missing arm certainly didn’t seem to bother her.

He lay there in bed as the usual sounds of the morning city washed over him, remembering their repeated couplings throughout the afternoon, some dreamy part of his mind wondering what life would be like if they were wed and every night was spent like that. He sighed ruefully at the impossible thought. By now he’d learned that his status condemned him to being nothing more than an audacious dalliance for girls of Lanicia’s upbringing, some spicy sexual shenanigans before her inevitable society wedding. Still, there were worse things, he decided. And Lanicia had seemed different to the normal debutantes – more independent, smarter, more curious about the world. Not so . . . pointless. He shook his head at such whimsy and went into the little bathroom.

Slvasta had lodgings in Number Seventeen Rigattra Terrace, a nice four-storey white stone building overlooking Malvine Square, in the centre of one of Varlan’s more affluent districts. A proper gentleman’s residence. The landlord (from an old metropolitan family) had been delighted to accept a bachelor officer, even though Slvasta was only from a county regiment. The rent alone was equal to his captain’s salary, but of course that was paid for by the regiment.

Water gurgled in the pipes as he turned on the brass tap; as always, he had to wait a minute for it to warm up. There was a communal boiler somewhere in the building, burning logs loaded by the landlord’s mod-dwarfs. Everybody in Number Seventeen had one or two of the mods as servants. The practice was so well established that the building actually incorporated their pens in the basement, with a separate warren of passages and little doors opening into all the residents’ rooms. But Slvasta, of course, refused to have any kind of mod in his lodgings and had bolted the little door from the inside as well as putting a heavy dresser in front of it.