Bountiful filled the air above him. The corona-hunter wasn’t flying, and it wasn’t quite falling; the craft existed between those states. But it wasn’t burning either. Two fletches were burning against the thin trees of the canopy, and a third fletch—the one that had started the attack—was part way through a hard turn, bladders punctured, blue fires making the corona scales glow.

Maybe another fletch was directly below him.

Just that one unlikely possibility gave Tar`ro enough confidence to roll over. Sure enough, there were several ships below, each driving hard toward him. He saw fletches from his District and ships from the main fleet and in the distance were the giant vessels, including the Ruler of the Storm.

What a sight, and all for him . . . Tar`ro thought . . . and then he remembered that he was a realist, cold and tough, and a lifetime of practice threw him back into that familiar, reliable state.

He was dead.

The wilderness canopy was high and sparse, and Tar`ro was still far above the reef’s level. A man could fall for a very long time in this realm. He didn’t want any of this, but this was how it was. He thought about watching Bountiful’s progress, seeing if the ship could somehow make the reef, or he could study the battle that was taking shape in the air around him. But instead he ignored his surroundings, thinking about his former colleague, about Bits. Not often but a few times the two men had sat together in a tavern popular among the boy’s bodyguards, and they drank too much and talked too freely about various subjects. They were never friends but were always friendly, and Tar`ro had insisted on believing that he had a clear sense of the man.

But he hadn’t, no.

Then Sophia got into his head. One little plan of Tar`ro’s was to ask her out for drinks, just the two of them. He had some other ideas that dangled nicely from that one event. But she was dead and he was dead, and if there was something after living, he only hoped there was hardened wine involved.

Tar`ro thought about wine.

He thought about women, real and otherwise.

And he felt as if he hadn’t moved. The demon floor was remote, almost unreal. He considered putting his head down and driving hard. But this wasn’t that bad, falling slow and easy.

Then he remembered Diamond saying something about a sister.

What craziness was that?

Sitting in the classroom or standing outside that big window, the bodyguard sometimes glanced at the boy, just for a moment, and out of nowhere he’d find himself thinking about the enormous things that could hide inside even a little brain. And on those occasions, whenever Tar`ro forgot that he was a cold realist, he usually became sick with his self-induced terror.

Here he was, falling and falling, and he didn’t feel half so scared as he was thinking about a crazy kid.

Now what could be more peculiar than that?

Zakk sat on a nob of sourlip coral, using his binoculars to watch the battle.

Once he realized that Divers had run toward High Coral Merry, the young man started to chase her. Of course it was ridiculous to believe that he would catch her. His little body couldn’t cope with the rough, unforgiving ground. The same knee was skinned twice, as well as both elbows. It wasn’t long before he was too exhausted to move, and even now, after sitting for ten recitations, he was still breathing hard, sweating and tasting blood in his mouth.

This was nobody’s plan. This was never what he had imagined. But against long odds, he insisted on believing even now that there was hope, that whatever happened next would afford him the chance to talk and charm, eventually wriggling out of whatever trap was about the descend on him.

Hadn’t he done that for his entire life?

Of course coming here had to be the ultimate trap. The man in charge of the operation had made quite a lot of noise about limited risks and eventual rescue. But really, how could any rational person believe that escape was likely?

“And if I don’t come home,” he said to the man. “What about my mother?”

“Your payment becomes her payment. And if the mission is successful, she gets your full bonus too.”

Mother was a big plain lady with a secret bit of papio in her family history. As soon as her son was old enough to understand, she confessed that his father had been a diplomat stationed in the District of Districts—a smallish papio living far from home, living with a significant drinking problem and a habit of abusing local women. Her only child looked papio at birth and every day since. That’s why he was raised in a special school for the handful like him. He was taught his father’s language and the coral-bound customs, and then he was fully grown, as big as he would ever be but still wearing a child’s voice and proportions. That’s why he was selected ahead of everyone else. Alone among his peers, he could pretend to be a special boy, inserted into another child’s life for a few critical days.

Someone special was living near Bright River. The man in charge told him that secret, and suddenly he was Zakk. That was his new name, the same as a papio boy who was going to be sent to that remote place, ready to serve as a caretaker for that exceptionally odd creature.

One day the Archon of Archons came to visit the school. That was a great honor; nobody needed to tell him so. The Archon called him a hero and examined his body, and then he explained how the papio kept their secrets. Zakk would learn nothing of substance until he arrived at the secret site. Caretakers were allowed to call home, but since every call-line was monitored at both ends, he had to speak to the real Zakk’s parents. A vocabulary of code words had been built from ordinary words. One relay station along the reef had friendly ears, and every important meaning would be transmitted straight home. But the Archon promised that the mission wouldn’t be a success until Zakk was home, and then the two of them could sit inside the palace, calmly discussing everything that he had seen and every impression that he had earned.

The boy who wasn’t a boy nodded. “I’ll be talking to the real Zakk’s mother and father,” he said.

“You sound more than a little like him,” the Archon promised. “With the distance and interference in the lines, they won’t know the difference.”

“And nobody else will see the trick?”

The little man puckered his lips before saying, “Not immediately. We have a sturdy network in place, something that I inherited with my office. Records and your credentials will make everyone happy, for a few days at least.”

The papio-shaped man was happy enough to smile.

“This is an enormous opportunity,” the Archon said. “For you and for the world.”

The new Zakk kept nodding and smiling.

“This is a very special creature that they’re holding,” the Archon began.

“Like your son?”

A smile blossomed. “A gift from the corona, yes.”

“And like Diamond.”

“One of a kind.” Then the Archon reached out, squeezing the young man’s shoulder. “But the papio are different than we are. We are good to our children, but they’re torturing theirs. We have evidence, strong evidence, that they have savaged him once and probably will again.”

He knew about the papio. They were drunks and rapists, and often worse, yes.

“What happens to the real Zakk?” the spy asked. “Where will that boy be?”

The Archon’s smile changed, but it stayed a smile. “Oh, he’s going to be sidelined for a little while. But don’t worry. No harm comes to him, or anybody else.”

“I’m not worried,” the new Zakk said.

Then their conversation paused. The Archon surveyed the classroom, eyes focusing on the cages filled with animals and corals from the papio realm. The man was struggling to find some comforting words to add to the pile.

The new Zakk said, “Diamond.”