‘Someone from Deltaville,’ said Tannier. ‘They found a big flotation bubble – good thinking on your part – and pulled you in. You were lucky that you hit the right current and that we’re visiting, what with the birth being due and all.’

‘I was chasing Helsen. She was on board a flyer, and I went after her. But she attacked my quickbug, and I—’

‘Nearly died, but never mind.’ Tannier’s tough, ugly-handsome face creased up in a smile. ‘Officially I should reprimand you. Off the record, well done for trying.’

‘She got away. I should’ve called you.’

‘Next time, please do.’ Tannier gestured, causing Roger’s tu-ring to beep. ‘Now you’ve got my ident, you might want to set it as the emergency services port ID.’

Roger tipped his head, closed his eyes to inhale – it felt only a little unnatural, smartgel coating his lungs like mild phlegm – then breathed out and looked at Tannier.

‘Why aren’t you more annoyed? And what was all that about currents and births? Or did I hear it wrong?’

‘All the cities are on converging trajectories,’ said Tannier. ‘Because of Conjunction coming up – which is what it sounds like – but that’s still several tendays away. We’re still far removed from each other, on the whole.’

‘Er, right.’

‘But Deltaville’s close to giving birth, so Barbour’s planning to be nearby when it happens. In fact, if it hadn’t been for Conjunction, there would have been several more cities clustering alongside for the occasion.’

Roger tried to parse the implications from Tannier’s words, then put it aside for later. He preferred to read online rather than ask questions that would sound childlike.

‘So is that where you think Helsen went?’ he said. ‘Deltaville?’

Tannier said, ‘That’s the most likely destination, though not definite. She might have configured her flyer for a long haul to Popper or Dalton, maybe further.’

About to ask about the various authorities tracking incoming flyers, Roger stopped, not needing another lecture on privacy. A Pilot was supposed to be sensitive to cultural variations, not keep tripping over them.

‘What can I do to help you?’ he asked.

Tannier stared at him.

Then: ‘For now, rest up with your lady friend, and keep out of sight and trouble. We’ll need you to identify Helsen.’

Her theft of the autodoc and flight from Barbour were making Tannier, and by extension the Barbour authorities, take the matter seriously.

‘Helsen’s made her first tactical mistake,’ said Roger. ‘Hasn’t she?’

‘What do you mean? For an offworlder to make such good use of our systems and get clean away … I call that pretty slick.’

Roger finally smiled.

‘Yeah, but if she’d just kept her head down here in Barbour, the most you’d have had is a strange report from a youngish Pilot who sees things that others don’t, not even other Pilots. Right?’

‘Good point.’ Tannier grinned back. ‘Except we take all reports from the public with equal seriousness.’

‘Sure you do.’

How would Dad have analysed this situation? Imagining yourself in the opponent’s position was the usual first stratagem.

‘If Helsen just wanted to hide,’ he added, ‘she would have kept more low-key, don’t you reckon?’

‘Go on,’ said Tannier.

‘So if she’s trying for another Anomaly, what resources does she need to gather?’ He remembered something Dad had said about categorising problems. ‘What people does she need? What technology? And what processes does she have to organize to make it happen?’

‘Hmm.’ Tannier was nodding. ‘Good questions. I’ll ask the people with the big brains what they think. So far, Helsen has only one specific objective that a simple copper can deduce.’

Roger said, ‘What’s that?’

Tannier’s voice went mild.

‘She seems to want you dead, don’t you think?’

Time slowed, in a non-relativistic sense. Three tendays passed while Roger lived with Leeja, enjoying more uninhibited sex than he had thought possible; going for ever-increasing long slow distance runs along Barbour’s upper galleries (where yellow-tinted view-windows looked out onto orange clouds and more recently the growing bulk of Deltaville); and regaining his strength and coordination with the combat-dance-acrobatics routines he had used for years, but had stopped more recently since the reality of violence became clear. Now he used the routines to elongate his muscles and keep his movements whippy, without the illusion that they made him a fighter. That, if he was serious about it – and he still had doubts – was something that would surely have to wait until he returned to Labyrinth.

Sometimes he daydreamed of wolves and axes in ways that afterwards were unclear.

In keeping with Pilot practice, he said little to Leeja about life in mu-space, never mentioning Labyrinth’s name. Perhaps because of Conjunction, when Molsin’s sky-cities came together once every four standard years, Leeja seemed to assume that Pilots lived with their ships clustered together. Roger hinted she was right, without ever telling a literal lie. For the first time, despite having had to hide his own nature as he grew up, he appreciated what Dad (and to some extent Mum) had gone through as they lived a life of subterfuge, interacting with their friends and colleagues on Fulgor through interfaces of deceit, layers of indirection hiding the complexity beneath, much as his tu-ring accessed local city services not knowing how they were implemented.

Once, out walking with Leeja, he spotted Alisha looking into a shop window, a peculiarity of Barbour: back home on Fulgor, shops had existed, but with no need to display their wares to anyone outside – that was what Skein was for. Alisha did not turn; but if she had, she would have seen just another stranger in the crowd.

After they had walked past, Leeja said, ‘So that was her, was it?’

Roger stopped, then kissed her. As always, even the lightest contact with her softness felt like absorption, turning into a composite organism in the only manner humans should.

‘And that’s you,’ he said. ‘The only woman in my life.’

‘I know. But she’s young, isn’t she? Like you, although you appear older.’

‘Maybe because you’ve worn me out.’ Smiling: ‘In the nicest possible way.’

‘Bad Roger.’ She kissed him back. ‘Come along.’

But he could feel her sadness as they walked on.

TWENTY

LABYRINTH, 2603 AD (REALSPACE-EQUIVALENT)

In Labyrinth, time could flow in any way one liked. Max Gould had been awash in pain for so long he perceived it as a single, ongoing instance of agony, the one surprise being the strength that remained in his screams. He was an instrument; suffering was the music; Fleming was the master musician. And now, amid the normal purple lightning, silver light was brightening, which meant that Fleming was coming back.

I still hurt.

How many layers was it now?

Three. No … seven.

Not good.

Try to remember.

Or perhaps he had already given everything away. The layers upon layers of lies – entire world-views of falsehood laid on top of each other, a sequence of cover stories – were beginning to shift in his mind. But he could not have broken yet, not completely.

Because Fleming continued to bring the pain.

‘Commodore.’

Changing his voice now, the bastard.

‘Commodore Gould, look at us.’

Us?

Dried blood cracked and wet blood trickled as he moved his head and squinted. A man and a woman, right enough. Fleming’s reinforcements.

Bastard.

Everything already hurt. What more was there?

‘My name is Clayton. My friend here, we’ll keep her name out of it for now.’

Secrets. Everyone had them.

Everyone wanted them.

‘Come on.’ Hands upon him. ‘We’re moving you now.’

Flares of agony.