“No. Do you want me to go outside and check?”

“No, Dudley, that’s all right. I’m tired, I wasn’t really sure.”

“Okay then. What are you doing today? Have you found those lawyers yet?”

“Not yet. But I’ve got a job that should put me close to them.”

“What sort of job?”

“I’m a trainee cleaner at the clinic.”

The image of Kaspar Murdo’s overly friendly face as he acted as her protector and mentor in the belowdecks club filled her mind. All his glib words, his saccharine smile. The deep meaningful conversation he’d wheedled out of her after they went back up to the top deck as the Cypress Island headed home in the small hours, listening sympathetically to Saskia’s ambitions, admiring how she’d left home to strike out for herself. He was good, Mellanie saw; a lot of youngsters would fall for that concerned guru act.

As the Cypress Island turned back out onto the Logrosan he’d said he would see what he could do about finding her a job, and offered to rent her his spare room. His last tenant had “just left” and it was very cheap. She’d accepted after a convincing show of uncertainty. Alessandra’s people would watch her apartment on Royal Avenue when they realized Dorian was never going to be reporting back. They were a complication she really didn’t need.

Murdo’s open plan apartment in the Barbican Marina condo was surprisingly large, with the curving external walls built from glass bricks making it very light and airy. The Scandinavian-style furniture was old but high quality, and every room was spotlessly clean. There were two bedrooms, and one other room that was locked and screened with a commercial e-seal generator.

He’d been the perfect gentleman, giving her a big toweling robe so she could use the bathroom. There were other clothes he happened to have, a sweatshirt and jeans near her own size that she was welcome to use until she collected her own stuff. He bid her good night as he turned in. His shift didn’t start until six that evening.

She’d taken a shower, her OCtattoos detecting sensors all around the limestone-tiled cubical. They were active, allowing Murdo to examine every millimeter of her naked body back in the sanctuary of his bedroom. When she got back to her room after the shower she found its ceiling was inlaid with a high-quality holocamera ring. Murdo certainly liked to keep watch over his possessions.

“How in heaven’s name did you get that job?” Dudley asked.

She smiled in the darkness, wondering what Murdo would make of that. “I made friends with the janitor,” she said.

***

Following Bernadette Halgarth was a complete nightmare. Jenny McNowak could remember the worst-case training sessions Adam had put her and the other Guardians through, keeping tabs on their designated target through dense cities and desolate countryside on a dozen different worlds, with everyone taking turns at being the target so they could get a feel for procedures on the sharp end. Those were walks in the park compared to this.

The first thing she and Kieran agreed on was that Bernadette knew she was being followed. When she finally emerged from the Octavious just after ten that morning she launched straight into a series of classic evasion maneuvers. The only buildings she went into were crowded malls with multiple exits, or skyscrapers that had vast underground levels that connected to neighboring structures with equally complex layouts. Where she walked along streets, cybersphere nodes and civic arrays suffered kaos attacks that affected any systems that were accessing at the time. She took taxis for a block, then switched as the local traffic management arrays crashed under more kaos. The monorail was a favorite, waiting until the last second as the doors closed before hopping on board.

As a result they had to stay close, which they couldn’t really afford, because that would mean getting spotted by the larger and better equipped navy team. Two times, Jenny was sure she’d caught sight of small aerobots holding station several hundred meters above a busy street. If she’d caught a couple of glimpses, there must have been a whole squadron of the things deployed to patrol the sky above the city’s street grid. They allowed the navy team to keep a long way back, while her own team had to crunch up the distance again whenever Bernadette hit the streets—another maneuver that left them susceptible to discovery by the navy.

“I’ve never known them to use so many people,” Kieran said as they were meandering around the rim of Haben Park. Bernadette was walking through the broad open grassland, staying away from the paths. There was a monorail station in the middle, which they were sure she was going to use. Jamas was loitering around the entrance, ready to scoot up to the platform ahead of her if she should double back.

“It’s unusual for them to have anyone on the ground when they’ve got aerobots covering the area,” Kieran said.

“They can hardly send the aerobots into a building after her.”

“No, but the way they’re deploying is almost as if they want to be seen.”

Jenny had provisionally tagged a couple of the navy team, who were also loafing on the periphery of the park.

“This is becoming farcical,” she said. “They’re going to spot us even if she doesn’t. We can’t keep following her like this all day. Their scrutineers will catch our encrypted traffic if nothing else. We’re trained in avoiding observation teams, not being one.”

“You’re right,” he said as Jamas walked past a woman they suspected was navy. “Everybody disengage. We’re going to change tactics.”

“What are you doing?” Jenny asked.

“I’m going to watch the watchers. It’s the logical choice.”

Jenny bit back on any criticism. It was a risky decision, but carrying on like this simply was not an option. She watched Bernadette change direction quickly, and hurry for the escalator up to the elevated platform. It was a junction station, with four possible directions for the monorail trains to take. The woman they thought might be navy was on the station’s second escalator.

“Rosamund, Jamas, we’re taking this one.” Kieran sent them the visual file of a man who was strolling along a hundred meters ahead of them. “He’s been part of the navy box for fifteen minutes. They’ll rotate him now.”

Keeping the navy operative under observation was considerably easier. Kieran was right, he was being rotated, and he clearly had no idea he was being observed. After Bernadette slipped away along the monorail the man changed direction and caught a cab. The Guardians followed in three separate taxis, grinding their way through Tridelta’s daytime congestion.

The navy was using the Dongara Harbor police precinct as their headquarters. Hanging around the police building added a certain edge to the Guardian team’s operation, but the harbor had a lot of waterside bars and restaurants. They took it in turns to sit at the outside tables, scanning the precinct with retinal inserts.

Halfway through the afternoon Jenny called Adam. “Guess who just drove down into the precinct garage?”

“Tell me,” Adam said.

“Paula Myo.”

“Indeed? What with that and the Almada hotel fracas, I’m almost sorry I left.”

“But surely this is important? The navy is chasing a Starflyer agent. They must know it exists.”

“Paula is Senate Security, not navy, but yes, senior echelons of the Commonwealth political class must be at least aware of the possibility now. I’ll inform Bradley.”

“What do you want us to do?”

“Stay close to the navy team without compromising yourselves, and observe as much as you can. There’s obviously no way you can break into the Starflyer agent network through Bernadette anymore, but I would like to know what she’s doing on Illuminatus. I suspect the planet is where a lot of the Starflyer’s agents are wetwired; heaven knows we use it often enough. If Myo exposes one of their cells it can only act to our advantage.”