When the static dissolved, she shouted, “Are you safe?”

“Safer than you,” he said.

Even from a distance, Merit looked to be in agony—a man who had lost his wife and whose only child was in peril.

“Don’t tell me where you are,” she said.

He laughed at that, or the interference sounded like laughter.

“We’re trying to find the traitor,” she said.

“You’ve got multiple leaks,” he said.

“We don’t know that,” she began, but the static surged again.

Then the line quieted, and Merit was already talking. “ . . . but the papio wouldn’t want the trees dropped. They want Diamond. They’d love having my son for themselves . . . ”

A bright surge of electricity left her ear aching.

Merit’s voice chased the surge. “You can’t protect my son.”

“We can protect him and you,” she said, unsure whether she believed those words.

There was no response.

Had the connection broken?

No. By pure chance, the interfering racket subsided. Merit could have been standing inside the room beside her. Very clearly, he shouted, “Explain the situation. What’s going on at your end?”

Prima flinched.

“Do you hear me?” he shouted.

“Yes,” she whispered.

Lt. Sondaw stood before the closed office door, hands behind his back, maintaining the image of the faithful soldier. Yesterday’s young face was lost. The handsome mouth was tense, eyes swollen and red.

“There was a full assault on the Ivory Station,” said Prima. “Wings and shock troops. We were lucky to pull the government before everything burned.”

A little quieter, Merit asked, “Did they hawk you?” Chased, he meant.

“The wings followed us for a time, yes.”

“And then they let you get away.”

She nodded, speaking to herself as much as to the slayer. “They knew, I think. That we didn’t have what they wanted.”

“What about the Happenstance?”

“It escaped the Station, yes.”

“And the papio went looking for it,” he guessed.

“The Happenstance was captured, yes. Then destroyed.”

Merit cursed. “What about its crew?”

“Lost.”

Cut by the news, he said nothing.

Prima looked at the little desk. Nothing was on top but a broad stack of folders rescued from the Ivory Station, the top packet marked: CONFIDENTIAL, THE KING SYNOPSIS.

“You were smart, Merit,” she said. “Making your own plans.”

“Where’s List’s fleet?” he asked.

“I’d rather not say.”

He rephrased, asking, “Are the big ships protecting the bloodwoods, or are they pushing your way?”

The fleet’s motions couldn’t be concealed. Merit’s hiding place didn’t offer a view, or maybe he was pretending to be blind, intentionally misleading anybody who might be eavesdropping on the line.

Or the spies haunting her shadow.

Prima offered the nebulous truth. “Our allies are giving us helping hands.”

The slayer breathed once, deeply. “My wife?”

“Haddi’s still missing.”

Merit began to talk again, asking something else . . . but the static returned with his first syllable, frustrating both of them.

She put a hand on top of the King files, waiting.

Then the sputtering teased her, pretending to fade, and she said, “By nightrise, this will be the most secure District in the world. I’ll send out heavily armed patrols, and they can bring you in . . . ”

But Merit was speaking into the same electronic storm. “ . . . is most important to me,” he said. “And you appreciate that, I’m sure.”

She stopped talking.

He paused as well, and then with a careful tone said, “Madam. Did you hear me?”

“Your son is the most important part of this. Yes, of course he is.”

Through the curtain of white noise, the man shouted, “But do you understand why I would even consider this? Can you see my point of view?”

“What are we talking about?”

The noise worsened.

Then the line quieted at long last, and she said, “I couldn’t hear you. Please, tell me everything again.”

“Ten thousand ships can’t protect Diamond,” said Merit. “One maniac pointing one cannon decides to shoot Bountiful, whatever the reason, and my son burns and falls through the demon floor.”

She bristled, but there was no fighting the logic.

“I intend to go where I need to go. Protecting my boy is everything.”

A revelation squeezed her heart. “I understand,” she said.

“Do you?”

She saw the context and his thinking, yes. But what was lucid and reasonable to one desperate person made her weak.

“You’re thinking of going to the papio,” she said.

“Give me a better target,” he said.

“For now, hide,” she said. “Move when you have to move, and call me on a fresh line tonight, tomorrow. I’ll work through the day and make everything safe.”

Merit said nothing.

She waited.

Then once again, he said, “Traitors.”

“We have several suspects,” she admitted.

“Who—?” he began.

But that overly long thread of copper and electricity finally failed, and nothing was left to hear but the steady whisper that inhabited every empty call-line—a voice that never breathed or used words; the voice from which a determined ear could pull free anything that it wanted to hear.

Diamond was sitting at the back of the machine shop, the monkey at his side.

The crew walked past the pair, looking at the boy in quite distinct ways. They were interested in him and they smiled at him, but they were suspicious too. They were scared of quite a lot today, perhaps including him, and maybe they weren’t angry but there was always a raw, furious quality to the faces. Each man used every one of those expressions, sometimes within the same few strides. And sensing these shifting, combustive moods, it was easy to believe that one of them was his enemy. Father had offered a thousand assurances about the loyalty and honor of these people, but those faces showed Diamond too much. Nothing but time stood between now and the moment when somebody else would try to kill him.

The idea was vivid and deep, and then the idea turned into belief. Belief was as good as fact. Belief felt like truth and became nothing else. But that grim truth wasn’t as terrible as he would have guessed. Some mechanic or harpooner would show the boy a mysterious grin, and his heart quickened. Or Bountiful’s captain would toss a little wink his way, and tiny places inside Diamond—tissues and talents without names—began to ready themselves for trouble.

“Are you all right?” Elata asked.

“I guess.”

Not believing him, she glanced at the Master.

“Are you sure?” asked Nissim.

Even Good studied him.

Diamond shook his head. He wasn’t certain about his wellbeing, no.

Tar`ro looked at the boy, chewing on his tongue as he made his appraisal.

“Yeah, what’s wrong?” Seldom asked.

Too many answers begged to be offered. Diamond refused all of them, pointing across the huge room. “Something’s happening over there.”

The winking captain had just walked past them. Two crewmen were standing before the open door. Bountiful’s top harpooner had been bolting one of the air-powered guns into its proper cradle. Five spears rested nearby, each fat with explosives and timers, and a mechanic was working on a sixth spear, rebuilding it to kill machines instead of coronas. Except he wasn’t working as much as he was glancing outside, looking down at some odd thing. The harpooner was doing the same. And Diamond could think of nothing but his father’s return.

The captain approached the two men, and the harpooner stepped close, their faces near enough to kiss.

Diamond watched the man and woman talk.

The captain didn’t look outside. She studied the eyes in front of her, and then she stepped back and pretended to examine the heavy gun, holding its handles while aiming at the open air.

Smiling, the mechanic said a few words.