Ean shook.

  “You’ll like our captain, Linesman. She’s a good soldier.”

  “Thank you.” He hoped she hadn’t made the trip just to tell him that.

  It must have shown in his face, for she laughed. “Hardly. I would have collared you after the session. No, I come up here to look at the architecture.” She stopped as more soldiers got on at the next stop. These were Nova Tahitians. They saluted her and kept moving as if they’d always meant to pass through.

  “And sometimes to scare the rank and file,” Favager said.

  “Oh,” and Ean picked up on the only word that felt safe for conversation. “Architecture?”

  “Haladea was settled in the first wave after we got line ships. Back in those days, everyone based their buildings on Old Earth designs. That’s why your own world has taken so much from the Chinese dynasties.” He presumed she meant Lancia. “This one. Ancient Greece. We’re losing it now, with all the new building that’s going on, but there are pockets. Up here, for example, we have the finest Corinthian columns in the galaxy, and that includes on Earth itself.”

  The cart jerked to a halt. They got out. Favager’s uniform gave them space and fast access to the exit.

  Up so high, they could see the city spread out below them. Favager pointed to the central section. “Down there, that’s all tidal land.”

  It looked like barracks to Ean.

  “It used to flood when the three worlds came into conjunction. Until they built the tidal walls. Those walls are a hundred meters high.”

  “Behind us.” Favager indicated the stone cliff, from which buildings had been hewn out. There was a wide stone pathway between the buildings, flanked by massive, carved-stone columns. “See those columns. That’s based on the Temple of Zeus, from Earth. It’s gone now, of course. Even the records are gone. Those Old Earth records can’t be read by technology built on lines. Those that we can read—” She sighed.

  “Have you been to Old Earth?” Ean asked. She made it sound so personal, whereas to him, Earth was just something that had happened so long ago, it wasn’t real anymore.

  “There’s not much there,” Favager said. “It’s mostly desert. There’d be, what, 20 million people if you’re lucky. They live on tourism, and there’s not much of that. It’s sad, really.”

  She kept up a monologue, describing each of the buildings as they passed them. “That’s based on the Acropolis.” It, too, had massive stone columns. “Not that it looks much like the original.”

  Favager, Ean decided, was an Old Earth nut.

  She left them outside their destination with a final, “You will like our captain, Linesman.” She continued on across the plaza, stopping occasionally to glance at one of the stone columns, or another piece of architecture.

  “I know where I’ll go when I want to learn anything about Old Earth,” Ean said.

  Radko laughed. “She’s quite overpowering, isn’t she?”

  The Night Owl was set off to one side of the cliff face. There were dizzying staircases set into the rock at regular intervals leading down to the barracks. The staircases were full of soldiers making their way up or down. It made Ean’s legs ache just watching them. He was glad they’d caught the cart up.

  The bar was busier than Ashery at Festival time. Three-quarters of the patrons were in uniform. Most of them were simple spacers with pockets as bare as Ean’s. He saw Ru Li and Gossamer, who ignored him. Or didn’t notice him, he wasn’t sure which.

  Rigel was waiting for him, which was good, because he had no idea where to start looking. “I’ve hired us a table.” He dragged Ean across to a reserved table where a woman was seated, and sighed with relief as the noise canceling came on. “You haven’t changed your taste in bars, at any rate.”

  The bar Ean had frequented at Ashery had always been full of apprentices and lower-level linesmen. It was cheap, and it was close to the cartel house.

  “I can’t afford any better,” Ean said.

  He was on the same contract he’d signed with Rigel. It didn’t pay much, and it had another ten years to run. As Michelle had told him once, “We’ll make it up to you somehow, but we’d be stupid to change the contract. This way you’re bonded watertight to me.”

  Once Ean would have hated the thought of being bonded to a member of the royal family of Lancia. How times had changed.

  He didn’t recognize the woman until she stood up and hugged him. “Ean.”

  “Kaelea.” He hugged her back. “What are you doing here?”

  He turned to Radko. “This is Kaelea. She’s a linesman from House of Rigel.”

  There was silence while the two women sized each other up.

  “This is awkward,” Rigel said, with forced jovialness. “If I’d realized—”

  Ean realized what he thought. “Oh. Radko’s not—”

  Radko cut across him, “You’re a level-seven linesman?”

  Not that you could tell from the clothes Kaelea wore, but Radko wouldn’t have cut across him if she didn’t want him to shut up. Ean bit his bottom lip and didn’t say anything more.

  “Why don’t we sit down?” Rigel said, with forced oiliness. He sat down himself, as if glad to.

  Ean slid onto the seat opposite Rigel. Kaelea moved to sit beside him. Somehow, Radko got there first and slid between them.

  Kaelea looked put out as she sat beside Radko.

  The joys of being a bodyguard, Ean supposed. People misinterpreted what you did and why you did it.

  “Let’s order drinks,” Rigel said. He looked at Radko. “Maybe your girlfriend might like to—” He waved a hand at the crowd behind them.

  “I’ll sit.” Radko sat back and closed her eyes. “It’s noisy out there.”

  “She won’t be in the way,” Ean said. Normally, the cartel master would have been all over a beautiful woman, and Radko was attractive. She bore a distinct family resemblance to Michelle, except her hair was shorter and golden brown rather than black, and her eyes weren’t the distinctive genetically engineered Lancastrian royal blue. Ean had never asked, but he suspected Radko wouldn’t have to dig hard to find a direct ancestor to someone in the royal family. She had the same dimples.

  It shouldn’t have been awkward even if Kaelea was here.

  Rigel looked around, almost as if he was looking for someone, then shrugged and perused the drinks menu. Ean ordered after him. “Tea,” Radko mouthed, when he looked her way, even though she didn’t appear to open her eyes to see him looking at her.

  He punched the order through.

  Rigel sat back. “I hear you’ve been busy.”

  What had he heard? Was he fishing for information about the ships?

  “Same old, same old,” Ean said. “Lots of lines to mend.” Although Rossi did as much of that as he did, more, actually.

  They were at war, and Rigel and Kaelea were on the opposite side. He needed to remember that.

  It was a funny war when your enemies could visit you in what was, effectively, enemy territory. Why hadn’t they locked down the Haladean worlds? Radko had said the other day that Lancia was closed to Gate Union ships now. Balian and Aratoga had closed their worlds as well.

  “Given you’re the only ten in the New Alliance, you’re probably run ragged,” Kaelea said. “I can see they’ve got you mending their warships. Co-opted you into the fleet, even,” and she glanced at Radko, as if that explained how he came to be going around with a soldier.

  There was also Rossi. “It isn’t that much different to what I used to do with Rigel,” Ean said. It wasn’t a lie, not the line-repairing part. “When they ask me to fix lines, I fix them.”

  “And there’s plenty of that,” Rigel said. “The backlog from the confluence isn’t going down much.”

  Their drinks arrived. Aged Grenache for Rigel and Kaelea, tea for Radko, Lancian wine for Ean.

  “My,” Rigel said. “Your taste has improved.”

  He hadn’t even realized he’d ordered it. It was what they drank on the Lancastrian Princess. It had been automatic. Even now, it was a comforting reminder that Michelle and Abram were looking after him. He smiled as he raised the glass to his lips.

  “I’ve developed a taste for it.”

  “On the contract you had with me, you couldn’t afford wine like that. They must be paying you more.” Rigel was fishing. Line contracts were Rigel’s business. Changing a contract midcontract was as bad as walking out on one.

  “I wish,” Ean said. “My contract hasn’t changed. I do a lot of work with Lancia. They offer Lancian wine on ship. And I’m busy. I don’t have anything else to spend my money on.”

  Rigel nodded. “Busy times for all of us.”

  “It is,” agreed Ean, savoring his chilled wine.

  Radko sipped her tea with her eyes nearly closed, but he thought she gave a tiny smile of approval.

  Morton Paretsky slid into the seat beside Rigel. Rigel looked relieved.

  Ean had met Paretsky once, back when he’d been certified, and Paretsky had been grand master of the cartels. Ean’s own certification had been unusual for a ten because he’d been certified through a public ceremony. Most tens went to the grand master for private certification. Rigel had made Ean do it in public, along with the dozens of other linesmen. It was only after he’d been certified as a ten by the tester hurriedly brought in to test his level that he’d been taken to the Grand Master to get his bars. Paretsky had been grim and angry.

  “You should have brought him to me for personal certification,” he’d said.

  At the time, Ean had thought Rigel’s choosing a public certification was because he was too mean to pay the money for a private ceremony. Now he was sure it was because Paretsky would have failed him. Ean’s untrained approach to the lines hadn’t gained him any followers in the higher levels of the cartel system.

  Today, Paretsky was genial and smiling. “Guess who I met here.” He looked up and out, into the crowd, and Ean thought he was staring at a white-haired woman with pale skin. Or maybe the blue-haired older woman beside her, who was glaring at their table. Until Paretsky added, “Fergus Burns,” and Fergus slid in beside Paretsky.

  “Hello, Rigel,” Fergus said. “I haven’t seen you in years.” He held out his hand. “Last time I saw you was at Shaolin if I remember rightly. I must say, I like the hair.”

  Rigel smiled and almost preened. “Thank you. Done by DeGraves himself.”

  “And Kaelea,” Fergus said. “Last time I saw you was at Confluence Station. You’d come to fix the lines.”

  Just like that they were relaxed and talking. Fergus could do that. He knew everyone; he knew what they liked to talk about.

  “Lancian wine,” Paretsky said. “I might have some of that myself.”

  Fergus chose a cheaper wine—at least, Ean presumed it was cheaper—which was surprising, because he knew Fergus enjoyed Lancian wine as much as he did.

  The conversation roamed, from fashion, to travel—Rigel and Paretsky had no difficulty getting a jump—to linesmen Ean had only heard about. Janni Naidan, a ten from Laito. Geraint Jones, the ten from House of Rickenback. Which, of course, led to Jordan Rossi, who had been the other ten at House of Rickenback before Yaolin bought his contract.

  “How is Jordan nowadays?” Paretsky asked.

  “He’s fine,” Fergus said. He didn’t tell them he wasn’t Rossi’s assistant anymore, even though they obviously assumed that. “You know Jordan. He hasn’t changed.”

  “It must have been quite a blow, Rickenback’s selling his contract like that.”

  Fergus shrugged. “You know Jordan,” he said again.

  Both cartel men laughed. Paretsky, in particular, laughed until tears came to his eyes. “I feel for Leo,” he said. “Rossi has a long memory for injustices done to him.”

  In his role as the new Grand Master of the line cartels, Leo Rickenback had recently visited both Ean and Rossi. Ean had found him a good match for Fergus, deprecating and unexpectedly kind.

  Paretsky wiped his eyes. “I admit Leo’s selling his contract was a surprise. Still, it was a perfectly legal exchange even if Leo shouldn’t have done it.” He turned to Ean. “Your contract, on the other hand. That was extortion, pure and simple.”

  Was he talking about the length of it? Most line contracts ran for three to five years. Ean had been desperate enough to sign a twenty-year contract, but he had known what he was doing when he signed it.

  “I was happy to sign.” Rigel had promised to train him in more than the lines, and he had.

  Paretsky gave him an odd look. “The sheer effrontery of what Lady Lyan did. The arrogance of it.”

  He meant the signing over to Michelle. “It’s perfectly legal,” Ean said. Michelle’s lawyers had gone over the agreement in agonizingly minute detail. They’d spent weeks on it.

  “No, no,” Paretsky said. “She marched into Rigel’s home, held a gun to his head, and forced him to sign.”

  “It wasn’t quite like that.” She’d held the gun to Ean’s head. Only it hadn’t been a gun, it had been a disruptor. “She didn’t have a weapon when Rigel signed over the contract.”

  Ean had destroyed the disruptor before that. Although, knowing Michelle, she’d probably had a second weapon.

  “Lady Lyan tried to kill you,” Kaelea said. “I was a witness to that, Ean.”

  “Then she demanded your contract,” Paretsky said.

  Ean looked at Rigel. Surely, Rigel would explain. But Rigel just smiled, and said, “We’re here to fix a wrong that’s been done to you, Ean.”

  Non-Lancastrians didn’t understand the concept of revenge. “Rigel did contract a five out to Mi . . . to Lady Lyan when she asked for a six.”

  “I’m sure that was a mistake,” Paretsky said.

  “The five died.”

  “It was a misunderstanding,” Paretsky said. “No doubt Lady Lyan thought she was asking for a six when she actually asked for a five.”

  Ean took another sip of his wine while he considered what to say next. “Lady Lyan owns my contract now. She’s my boss.” They couldn’t honestly believe Michelle would let him go back to House of Rigel even if he wanted to, and he didn’t want to. He’d made a place for himself here. He wasn’t leaving Michelle. He wasn’t leaving the alien lines.

  “Only because she forced Rigel to sign the contract over.”

  Rigel wasn’t normally quiet, but today he let Paretsky do the talking. Ean studied his old cartel master’s face, trying to guess the expressions. They should have done this on a ship or a station, then he might be able to pick up from the lines how happy Rigel was about all this.

  “You’ll never make it stick,” Fergus said.

  Did Fergus even know what had happened?

  “We have witnesses,” Paretsky said. “Rigel. Kaelea here. And Ean. It should be enough. After all, everyone knows the high-level linesmen should be in the cartels.”

  “I’m not saying she did anything wrong,” Ean said. “And we’re at war. The New Alliance won’t hand my contract over to Gate Union.” He hoped. Did Rigel have the right of it? Could he force him to go?

  He might as well not have spoken.

  “I’m prepared to say what Lady Lyan did,” Kaelea said.

  Radko gave her a sharp look.

  “Even if they try to intimidate me.”

  “Against Lady Lyan.” Fergus sounded dubious. “What does Leo say about it?” The Grand Master oversaw all contract disputes.

  Paretsky made a dismissive motion with his hand.

  “Rickenback won’t be Grand Master much longer,” Rigel assured him.

  Paretsky intervened hastily. “You do know that Rickenback’s position is temporary,” he said to Fergus.

  “I didn’t realize it was a temporary role,” Fergus said. “We don’t get much cartel news out here. We’re very isolated.” Which was a lie. Fergus kept in touch. Ean himself knew more about current cartel doings than he’d ever learned at Rigel’s. “Does the position automatically revert to you, Morton?”

  Paretsky nodded.

  “When does that happen?”

  “These things take time,” Paretsky said.

  Fergus looked dubious.

  Ean glanced around the room, wanting this over with. Ru Li and Gossamer were dancing, Ru Li with his typical showy abandon. When the music stopped, they were close to the blue-haired woman Ean thought Paretsky had been looking at earlier. Ru Li bowed to her and held out a hand. His message was clear. Dance?

  She scowled at him, then scowled at Ean, as if she’d seen him watching them. Her gaze chilled him; he wasn’t sure why. After which she turned to a tall, dark-haired man standing near them, and looked pointedly at Ean again.

  The dark-haired man nodded and leaned back against the bar.

  His jacket opened to show what appeared to be a long pendant that stretched from his chest to his navel. It was patterned with ochres and browns, around two centimeters wide at the top, tapering to half that at the bottom.

  Surely not. A flick knife. When he’d been a boy, Marieke Cann had terrorized Ean with just such a knife. It still made him sweat, remembering it. The blade flicked out in a fraction of a second with enough force to impale a man—or a boy—without the holder having to do more than keep it steady.

  He was glad he was with Radko, and that some of Bhaksir’s team were in the bar. He turned his attention back to Rigel. It was his imagination, but he felt the blue-haired woman’s eyes boring into him.

  “I shouldn’t have let the contract go in the first place,” Rigel told Ean. “I did wrong by you. I’m trying to fix it.”

  The words coming out of Rigel’s mouth sounded unlike him.

  “I like my new job,” Ean said. “I like my new boss. We both know the contract is legal. Lady Lyan did not force or coerce you in any way. I’ll tell the Grand Master that.”