‘Oh, yes. I tried it out on Ma and her family when I followed you into town. I just wasn’t forceful enough, and I was in a hurry. This time I’ll get it right.’

An ANAdroid walked in carrying a large medical kit. Nigel selected an infuser and applied it to Akstan’s neck. ‘This will elevate his brainwave activity to borderline consciousness. We have a few techniques in the Commonwealth to subvert personality, dating all the way back to the Starflyer War, some more brutal than others. I think I’ll start with a modified narcomeme; that’s soft enough. It should help subdue any instinctive resistance. Then I’ll use Tathal’s procedure.’

Kysandra watched Akstan moan feebly. Thoughts grew out of his unshelled sleeping mind. She perceived her own face tumbling through the phantasms his semi-conscious brain was producing, the disturbing sexual obsessions she featured in, his anger at being thwarted mutating into perverted revenge fantasies.

All the lingering doubts she had about what Nigel was going to do dried up like field dew in high summer. Instead, she stood above the insensate Akstan, and used her ex-sight to perceive the complex stream of ’path that Nigel directed into his naked brain. It was interesting.

*

Heavy clouds swept in from the south-west to cover Adeone at eleven o’clock at night, obscuring the nebulas and bringing a cold persistent rain. By two o’clock in the morning, the town was asleep; pubs and clubs had closed, the docks were silent, the teams of civic mod-dwarfs had gone back to their stables. The miserable rain had even curtailed the activities of its more nefarious citizens.

Oil lamps along Lubal Street flickered and went out one by one, allowing the shadows to swell out and embrace its entire length.

Standing at the end of Lubal Street, with her shell deflecting the swirling raindrops, Kysandra looked at the Hevlin Hotel. In infra-red, the broad white façade was a dull luminous blue as the rain washed down the walls, cooling the structure.

Nigel stood directly to her left. Her ex-sight couldn’t perceive him at all. Naturally, Nigel had a far superior fuzz technique than anyone, which he’d gifted her, too. Concealment, he called it. It was only infra-red which showed her where he was, a green and blue profile where the rain dripped off his big brown coat. Infra-red also allowed her to see the others they’d brought with them: Akstan, his brothers and three ANAdroids, standing motionless behind her.

‘He’s good,’ Nigel admitted as the ex-sight swept along the street, as it did every couple of minutes. Their fuzz deflected it easily, but they were still forty metres away.

Someone was awake in the Hevlin’s lobby, faithfully watching out for trouble. Ma had too many enemies to leave the place unguarded, even on a night like this.

‘Akstan?’ Nigel queried.

‘It’s probably Snony,’ Akstan said. ‘He’s got good ex-sight. Reliable, too.’

‘We need to get inside without anyone raising the alarm.’

‘Leave it to me,’ Akstan said eagerly.

Kysandra had to press her teeth together and strengthen her shell so her feelings didn’t betray her. It had taken Nigel twenty minutes to turn the surly Akstan into an over-friendly eager-to-please disciple. She’d watched all of the sullen, sulky brothers start to behave with the kind of adoration that a puppy would exhibit.

Akstan and his brothers deserved no less; she wasn’t arguing that. But it was a sharp reminder than the man who treated her so kindly could also be completely ruthless. It made her glad she had been shown trust. But equally, she wondered if that appreciation was all her own. Had he used domination on her while she slept that day after their wedding? But . . . if he’d done that, would I ever question if he had? Unless that was part of it, making me doubt so I think I am free . . . Uracus.

‘Did you do that to me?’ she blurted as Akstan walked steadily towards the Hevlin.

Nigel turned and frowned. ‘What?’

‘Did you use Tathal’s domination procedure on me?’

‘No.’

Infra-red showed him grinning, his teeth glowed ruby red under the wide brim of his hat.

‘But I get that making you believe that is practically impossible,’ he said. ‘Ask yourself: why would I give you the Commonwealth memory implants?’

‘So I’m more useful.’

‘Ah, okay; good answer. So the second question is: why would I risk leaving you free?’

‘I don’t know. Why?’

‘Because I have great-great-great-great-great-granddaughters your age or younger. Because I am many bad things, but enslaving teenage girls isn’t one of them. Because I won’t have many genuine friends here, but you could be one. And, face it, I am kind of overwhelming, which is a sort of domination.’

She nodded slowly. ‘Are you really that old to have great-great – whatever – granddaughters?’

‘Oh, yeah. They’re all out there, on the other side of the barrier. Judging me.’

‘Uracus. So what bad things?’

Nigel chuckled. ‘I used my power and money to build an empire. Opponents got pushed aside. Pushed hard.’

‘You ruled people, like the Captain does?’

‘It was a commercial empire. Which, given its size, translates into political power. So yes, I ruled people. Just like the Captain does here. I choose to believe I was a reasonably benign dictator. Hardass, fanatical dictators never accomplish anything, and for all my faults I’m proud of what I achieved. Along with my friend Ozzie, I helped open the stars for our whole species, Kysandra; I was one of the founders of the Commonwealth. Long time ago, though.’

‘If you’re really that important, why are you here? Why did you come into the Void?’

His glowing grin widened. ‘Who else you gonna call?’

Her own lips lifted in response. That was Nigel. Odd yet reassuring.

Akstan walked into the lobby. The man behind the reception desk looked up, jerked his head in recognition. Akstan pulled out the air pistol Nigel had given him and shot the man in the throat. The sedative in the pellet worked fast. Surprise and shock had just registered, he was starting to ’path out an alarm, when his eyes rolled up and he collapsed.

‘Good work,’ Nigel ’pathed.

Akstan looked ridiculously pleased with himself.

‘Gas masks on,’ Nigel said.

Kysandra took out the slippery triangle of fabric and pressed it to her face. It adhered to her skin, covering her mouth and nose. She took a cautious breath; the filtered air was very dry, but apart from that perfectly normal.

‘Let them go, Russell, please,’ Nigel said.

It had taken Skylady’s synthesizers most of the afternoon to produce components to graft onto the small semiorganic ge-cats it had in storage. But after a solid three hours work, eight of the slick little creatures were now rodent-like enough to pass as bussalores. They were in a box carried by Russell, who put it down on the wet cobbles.

Kysandra’s ex-sight followed them scampering over to the Hevlin. Three of them went in through the front door Akstan was holding open. The remaining five veered off down the alleys on either side of the hotel. They entered through air bricks set level with the pavement, through cellar windows, through drainpipes. Pre-loaded directions sent them racing along corridors and through rooms. As they went, gas sprayed out through their anus vent, permeating the entire building. Sleepers drifted into an even deeper sleep, unaware as their dreams faded to nothingness.

Nigel waited outside in the rain, observing the creatures’ progress with his ex-sight. Ten minutes after the last artificial bussalore entered, he said: ‘All right, let’s go.’

He started to walk towards the Hevlin Hotel and the unconscious bodies it contained. Kysandra and the others followed.

3

Kysandra was desperate to start the expedition to the Desert of Bone. She’d never even seen a train before, let alone travelled half the length of the continent on one. And then an adventure was waiting for her at the far end. Yet at the same time, it was so hard to leave Blair Farm. In the six months since Nigel had arrived, crashing into her life, turning her existence into something extraordinary, the farm looked as she’d always imagined it would be if Dad had come back and run it properly. Teams of perfectly coordinated mod-apes and mod-dwarfs had built a waterwheel-powered timber mill beside the river. Then with the planks and posts cut from trees they’d felled, new barns were constructed. Hedges had been hacked back into shape, and fields ploughed and drilled ready with the seed crops they’d bought from town. Sheep, pigs, cows, chickens, goats, llamas and ostriches had been delivered from the local livestock market, and thrived under Skylady’s excellent proxy husbandry. The stable of mods expanded constantly. Machine shops were being put up. Each day there was something to help with and accomplish.