Diamond was watching Karlan.

The survivors had been ushered inside a never-big cabin in the blimp’s belly. Every seat had been heaved overboard—for weight and for room. But there wasn’t one piece of empty floor bigger than a handprint. People sat hip-to-hip, limbs often woven together. Little daggers of light came through the gaps in the curtains. One dagger kept catching the biggest face, round and imposing and drenched with tears. Like everybody else, the tyrant was weeping.

Karlan made no sound when he cried, Diamond noticed.

Seldom sat in front of his brother, tall but still tiny between the giant legs. Deep sobs ended with sniffles and panting breaths, and then after regaining his strength, Seldom would let the sobs begin all over again.

The big face looked at Diamond, and Diamond looked away. Then the face looked at the Master and finally at Tar`ro, and one of his hands attacked the tears on Seldom’s face, not his own, wiping them away as his sturdy voice said, “Yeah, this is shit. Shit, shit.”

Tar`ro sat with his back straight, wet eyes watching everyone. Or maybe his training kept him in that pose, letting him pretend to be alert even when his mind was lost in its private miseries.

Master Nissim seemed shrunken, ill. One arm was thrown over Diamond, as if trying to lend comfort. But as much as anything, he was leaning on the boy, inviting the warmth of that body into places cold and dark.

Good was curled up in Diamond’s lap.

Elata and Prue clung to each other, talking.

“I want my mommy,” said the little girl.

“I want mine,” said Elata.

Seldom took a long breath, rebuilding his strength. “Do you think our mom got away?” he asked.

“Quiet,” Elata said.

“Karlan,” said Seldom. “What do you think?”

“That you need to shut up,” said his brother, the voice flat and hard, but not angry, not strained.

The blimp’s engines were running fast. They were climbing slowly and making sharp turns, the daggers of sunlight constantly shifting positions.

Tar`ro was staring at Karlan.

Diamond was paying close attention to both of their faces.

Prue kept saying, “Mommy.”

There were moments when Diamond stopped thinking about his mother. But those were aberrations, coming when his brain was too full with too much and something had to be shoved aside. Suddenly Mother wasn’t sitting behind him or floating over him or wishing him a very good day. He was busy reliving the gunfight and clinging to the walkway, and children with faces and names were dying all over again, and with perfect clarity, he saw trees dropping out of this world again. Each tree was severed at the top and burning, and every person trapped on the branches and inside the trunk was turned to fire. Even those riding inside airships weren’t safe. How many blimps and fletches had been torn to scrap by falling debris? Diamond counted those he had witnessed. There was no way to forget what he knew, and no thought remained lost for long. Shutting his eyes, the boy willed his mother to appear, and Haddi was standing over him just as she had when he was little, cool fingers gingerly touching the forehead that always felt as if it had just come out of the oven.

Forgetting his mother was a failure, perhaps even a crime.

Each time he forgot, Diamond bent forward, focusing every thought on the woman, forcing her to seem as real as ever, which put him in a mood where he was certain that the old woman had survived. A creature that vivid, that rich, must have jumped free of Marduk, or maybe she was shopping on Rail but ran to Hanner in time, or she fell a little ways but then grabbed hold of one of the commuter airships that survived. Each of those unlikely scenes was equally plausible, and in those moments, doubting nothing, the only worry in him was the idea that his poor mother was sick worrying about him.

Diamond was alive, and Father, and Mother too.

In secret, the boy smiled, and that was when his thoughts turned wild again.

Tar`ro continued watching Karlan.

After another two recitations of silence, the giant returned the man’s gaze. “Staring is impolite,” he said.

“I’m curious,” Tar`ro said.

“Good for you,” said Karlan.

“About this morning,” the guard said.

Karlan shifted his weight, and after the silence built, he used a hand to wipe his own face, making it a little drier.

“You weren’t doing anything, were you?”

“In class? No.”

“But we got that call asking for help,” Tar`ro said. “Bits said you were beating up teachers.”

“Was I?”

“No.”

“Well,” said Karlan. “Bits was a liar.”

“Except the call-line did ring.” Tar`ro shifted his legs. “Even if you’re innocent, someone made that happen.”

“I’m sitting in the back of the room, pretending to read,” Karlan said. “Then you come flying in, and you give me how much of a look? Barely any. What I remember, you blinked and turned to Miss Ulla and started to ask her . . . I don’t know what, probably what was the trouble or if I had been bad . . . and that’s when Marduk started shaking . . . ”

“You don’t know anything,” Tar`ro said.

“That’s what I do at school,” Karlan said. “I sit and know nothing.”

Tar`ro cursed.

“But I followed you back,” said Karlan.

Most of the survivors watched Karlan, but Nissim and then Diamond stared at the guard, studying his face and the one hand that was out of sight, holding the butt of his little reserve pistol.

“The tree was breaking, and sure I chased you,” Karlan said. “Why the hell wouldn’t I? This bag was my best hope to get out of school alive.”

Tar`ro sighed.

“I saw your partners’ brains,” Karlan said.

The engines throbbed and the blimp started climbing again.

Karlan made a laughing face. “Which one made you the fool?”

Tar`ro said, “Quiet.”

“Because you’re an idiot,” Karlan said.

Tar`ro breathed deeply through his nose, his hand still massaging the unseen gun.

Karlan held still, ready for whatever happened next.

What happened next was a door opening and a policeman shouting down into the darkness.

“Ivory Station is open for business,” he called out. “And the Archon herself is waiting for us.”

FOUR

No district was eternal. Borders and names found ways to shift, as did the allegiances between seats of power. But the coronas had always lived beneath these trees, and Father knew every guess why: the creatures congregated below them out of habit or superstition, or this was where they preferred to hunt, or there was no better place to breed and raise their young. Or perhaps these were just the weakest members pushed out of an overpopulated realm. But even as he offered those possibilities, the retired slayer reminded his son that hunting and killing the coronas had taught him only how little he knew. It didn’t matter why the bravest or weakest or the most foolish coronas rose out of their realm, up into the cold whispery-thin air. They came to this world and both species of humanity thrived, and lucky slayers grew old enough to sit at their dinner table, explaining their ignorance to their sons.

There had always been an Ivory Station, regardless of its name or precise location. Today’s Station was a complex of buildings, fletch hangers, and critical offices fitted to together like blocks against Hanner’s giant trunk. A wide platform lay at its base, paved with silver corona scales, and twin pillars had always stood at the landing’s main entranceway. The pillars were built from corona teeth, predating Hanner as well as several long-dead trees. After the attack, brave souls took upon themselves to save those treasures, using power saws to cut them free of the wooden planks below. One of them was already on its side, ready to be shoved into a rude sling that would be carried off by the first available blimp. But the would-be heroes were noticed, reprimanded and ordered to more valuable posts. Later the police blimp appeared, towlines dangling, the spent, overheated engines leaking black fumes. Diamond was standing in the nose. Amplified voices and a set of bright flags ordered the blimp to one end of the landing, and a dozen big men grabbed the lines and tied them down. An audience had gathered near the tree trunk—soldiers and government workers, and the Archon, and standing beside Prima, one retired slayer.