"Why not take someone from his sibko then?"

"Marthe? No, he would run at the sight of her. And the other survivor from that sibko, this Bret, has left camp on assignment."

"Very well then. Tech Nomad it is."

She started toward the door.

"Falconer Joanna?"

She turned. "Yes?"

"Do not come back without him. If you do not find him, I will cut orders isolating you to a border planet, chasing bandit scum."

She smiled. "I am not sure I would dislike that as much as you think, Commander Ter Roshak."

"I want Astech Aidan back, Joanna!"

That I did not use her title registered immediately. Her eyes narrowed. I drop titles only for emphasis, and she got the message. She gave a rapid, old-fashioned salute, the kind that mocked the Inner Sphere military, and left my office.

Of all the persons I might have sent in pursuit of this young man, Falconer Joanna is the only one who might actually find him. She is the kind of determined warrior who would not slack or give up on any assignment.

I am certain she would like to know why I am sending her to chase him down, and I almost wanted to tell her. But my pleasure at watching her astonishment would have been only temporary. She would not approve my intention. She is one of those who believes a cadet has the right to only one chance at the Trial. She would balk at the second chance I plan for Aidan. Unprecedented as it is, as it must be.

Of course I cannot just decree a second chance. I will have to plan another identity for him, one he can use in the Trial. We cannot just manufacture one. We will have to take it from someone already here. A few people will have to die. I will have to arrange an incident. The concept appeals to me. An accident, a few secret little murders, a new identity, a second chance. If he succeeds the next time, there is no waste. If he does not, I will have no choice but to kill him, too.

26

More than a year passed before Joanna and Nomad found Aidan. The search had been long and laborious, consisting mostly of interviews with people who had either seen Aidan or who sent the investigators off on false trails. Along the way, the two worked together efficiently, while making life hell for one another.

Their reports, transmitted back to Ter Roshak at regular intervals, showed that Aidan set a fast pace, world-hopping almost frantically, as if no individual place could hold him. (At least, that was Joanna's repeatedly stated conclusion.) Roshak, on reading such comments, was reminded of the peripatetic Ramon Mattlov, who—never satisfied with anything in his life—was happiest when traveling.

Aidan had left Ironhold on a freighter, posing as a member of the laborer caste. Being in desperate need of a cargo-hauler, the bosun—like most merchant mariners on all planets—took the easy way out when Aidan claimed to have misplaced his papers. Aidan's Tech experience at Crash Camp served him well in the hold, and the bosun came to trust him.

When the bosun offered to sign him on for a tour of duty, Aidan pretended that he might accept the job, then he disappeared into the teeming city of Katyusha on the planet Strana Mechty. It had always been said of Katyusha that it was a city where anything and everything was for sale.

"I knew there was something odd about that kid," the bosun told Joanna and Nomad. "He did his job too well. But he did not steal anything. I can vouch for that. It is the rare cargo stiff who is not tempted by one of those capsules that break open, you know, accidentally?But Aidan, he was honest."

Joanna was not sure of the value of this information, but she was happy to get away from this DropShip officer, whose breath stank of offworld dream herbs.

Aidan evidently spent little time in Katyusha. From there, he took a short hop to Marshall, where he got into some trouble. They heard of this from a restaurant laborer they met in an eating establishment in the tough outskirts of an otherwise quiet city called Custer. From her, they learned that Aidan had picked a fight with a trio of Elementals who were in the restaurant imbibing a bucket of some local concoction. "The one you seek was taking his meal at a corner table," she said. "The Elementals were across the room. I was engaged in duties away from the main room when the Elementals finished their drinks and wanted another round. Not seeing me, they simply ordered the one you seek to get up and serve them.

"Well, this—you say his name is Aidan—this Aidan stood up and confronted the Elementals, looking ready to explode. By now I had finished with my chores out back and had entered the room in time to see what was coming, but not in time to stop it.

"One of the Elementals—a man called Stong—rose from his seat to chastise Aidan." The woman broke off her tale suddenly and, unable to continue, looked at the floor.

"Go on, Leonor."

"I do not know how to continue except to tell the simple, honest truth. I could not hear what words they spoke, but suddenly this Aidan marched over to the table of Elementals and stood toe-to-toe with Stong.

"Everyone of those fellows was a good head and a half taller than your young man, but he did not.even wait for the dare that surely would have been the next thing out of Stong's mouth. Those Elementals were, of course, even more enraged that he had insulted their ritual."

"Of course," Joanna said.

"It was a surprising fight. He tried to take on all three Elementals at once."

Nomad raised his eyebrows appreciatively, but Joanna gave him a baleful glare.

"For a while, I almost thought this Aidan was going to be able to floor all those giants lined up against him. But they were, after all, Elementals, and nobody could take on all three. They dealt him quite a beating, but still he would not satisfy their ritual."

"Now, what ritual was that?"Joanna asked.

"That he kneel before them and beg forgiveness, as befitting a member of the laborer caste."

"No," Joanna said reflectively. "He would not likely have done that."

"A wonder they did not kill him," Nomad commented matter-of-factly. "Elementals are not known for leaving survivors in close engagements."

"They might have," Leonor said. "I have seen warriors do so after such an insult even when the laborer performed the necessary ritual of forgiveness. It may be that the Elementals let him live in admiration of his defiance."

Continuing their search on Marshall, Joanna and Nomad turned up no further clues for awhile. Then Nomad, whose specialty was wandering into places where even warriors might fear to tread, learned from some dock-workers that someone fitting Aidan's description, but calling himself Damon, had left on a shuttle to Grant's Station only a few days before. When Joanna questioned Nomad about why he thought this particular person might be Aidan, Nomad pointed out that Damon was Nomad spelled backward.

Grant's Station was a Wolf Clan planet. There were times, those periods when relations between the Jade Falcon and Wolf Clans were strained, that a Jade Falcon warrior might have had difficulty gaining entrance to the planet. But this was a calm period, politically and socially, and Joanna, as a Jade Falcon officer, was actually welcomed. Perhaps too welcome, for Joanna's acquaintanceship with a 'Mech pilot named Alexey temporarily diverted her from duty. Nomad kept his own counsel, but her actions set him to wondering if this might have been the flaw that had exiled her to Ironhold in the first place. Left on his own, Nomad conducted his own investigations. Though he located several people who remembered Aidan, he uncovered nothing that would further their search.