They rattled and scaled and scarred the falling pod but they did not stop it. At three thousand meters the krekelen bailed out. At twenty-five hundred, Canon garrison took the pod under fire.

They reported the illegal destroyed.

In Hall of the Watchers they knew better. Track followed the krekelen to the surface and into the city.

— 4 —

Gloom was a fourth presence there with the three Immunes. Midnight said, "I don't want to go out there now. The Darkness has become the tyrant of the night."

Turtle replied, "Then don't go. Unless you have to dance tonight? Amber Soul and I could see you to the lift."

Midnight was a cloud dancer, engineered for that and exotic erotic usage in House Banat-Marath. Her owner of record, a House Director's whelp on wanderjahr, had become bored with his pretty toy and had discarded her, without documentation, her only assets those designed into her fragile body.

She had survived.

"No. Not tonight. There's little demand for me now."

"Funny. I'd think just the opposite. Eat, drink, and make merry. Maybe trouble will go away."

Midnight lived in the High City usually, drifting from sponsor to sponsor. If she fell out of fashion there, she worked the merchant baronets of UpTown, who strove to emulate the decadence of their overlords. But DownTown was her spiritual home, as it was for all the outcast, the discarded, the ignored, the ordinary, and the abhorred. Princes of lost and vanquished races languished there, hip by thigh with pimps and murderers and worse.

"What do they know in the High City?" Turtle asked. "What do they feel? What do they fear? What do they think?" Midnight was eyes and ears for the Immunes. The Canon lords did not guard their tongues around her. She was a nothing, invisible.

"They know there's unrest. But they vie at demonstrating their indifference. They're amused by the idea of rebellion. But the UpTown merchants are concerned. An uprising would be bad for business."

"Commerce will go to hell when that Guardship breaks off the Web. It will nail this rock down tighter than a marble in a sealed cannister."

Will one come? Sure? Amber Soul remained unconvinced.

She could not comprehend humanity. The personas she projected functioned adequately, but even to Turtle she seemed insubstantial, like a shadow cast from another dimension. There was no fathoming her in her natural state.

She was an incredible rarity. How she had come to be stranded on V. Rothica 4 was a mystery. Even she did not remember.

She had been around almost as long as Turtle. When he thought about it, he could recall when she was not there but not when she had arrived. He knew more about her than anyone, but what he knew was minute.

Amber Soul was a force in DownTown, an anima, feared by all, best ignored.

"They will come," Turtle assured her. "Sure as the darkness weaves the night from afternoon. The breath of death is less certain than the vigilance of the Guardships. Pray that the Concord does nothing stupid before the Guardship arrives. Its appearance will bank their ardor." He reflected a moment. "This krekelen business has an odor. I suspect a manipulation by some House."

"They wouldn't stir rebellion against themselves, would they?" Midnight protested. She remained as naive as Amber Soul remained mysterious.

"They would, and they have done. The Enherrenraat was born from a greed-fever dream in Cholot and Merod. The dream grew up to become a nightmare. Cholot and Merod are paying still. The fury of the Guardships was so exemplary that it has not been challenged since, but the universe spawns fools and insects in numbers beyond all reason."

Something tickled the outside walls; something tested the door. An odor hovered on the brink of perception, like the electric promise before a storm. There were rustlings and what could have been whispers, a harassment that had begun after Midnight's arrival. It had grown worse as darkness flowed like slime between the ten thousand legs supporting DownTown. It was pure night out now. The creatures of darkness were on the hunt.

One wall groaned and bowed as something huge pressed against it. A network of lines spread upon the bulge. They widened, overflowed one another, turned the brown of paper too near a flame.

Something oozed through, trickled down. It was the color of blood.

"That is quite enough!" Turtle snapped, exasperated.

Amber Soul rested spidery fingers upon the bulge. A psionic darkness filled the room, a ghost of menace that hammered through the wall. There were muted cries. Then silence.

"They are playing intimidation games. In their insanity, they will pass beyond games soon. We will confer with the others tomorrow. Steps must be taken."

There were eleven Immunes in Merod Schene. None supported the Concord.

Turtle turned to Midnight. "How is Lord Askenasry?"

"He's still alive. He grows weaker, though his will remains steel. He won't be with us much longer. I dance for him once a week. He no longer makes other demands."

"Will you dance for him again soon?"

"Tomorrow night."

"Does he remember me?"

"He asks about you sometimes."

"Ask if he will see me. Tell him I'm ready to collect."

"If we survive the night." A timorous creature, she was shaking.

"We will survive this night and many more," Turtle promised. "We will outlive the Concord. I must. I have much to do before I go."

— 5 —

... whine dying. An exclamatory ping!

Jo Klass drew a frigid breath of medicine and machine, opened her eyes. She felt eager, curious, a touch of trepidation. What would it be? Warming was like wakening to a day guaranteed to be exciting.

How long had she slept?

Not that it mattered. Nothing changed.

As always there was a moth flutter of panic as the air grew hot and humid. The cell walls pressed in. Its lid opaqued with moisture. She scrawled an obscenity in the condensation.

The lid opened. Beyond lay the familiar white overhead of the warming room. How many times had she wakened thus, staring up at that sky of pipe and cable? Too often to recall.

Air swirled in, chilled her.

What was it? Another Enherrenraat? Fear stroked her. She had died that time. It haunted her, though the bud had detoured her around it.

Sometimes she thought she dreamed about dying while she was in the cell, but she remembered no dreams once she wakened.

A face drifted into view. "Off and on, soldier." No relief at finding her alive instead of a shriveled blue-black mummy. No expression at all. Just on to the next cell and next check.

Jo bounced out as filled with vitality as anyone in perfect health could be. Her squad tumbled out of neighboring cells, as naked as she. Shaigon eyed her, thoughts obvious. "Watch it, soldier."

"I am, Sarge. I am." He lifted one shaggy eyebrow.

"Later. Maybe. If you're a good boy." She counted ears and divided by two. All present. "Let's move." Their cells had returned to stowage. The team followed her, mouthing the usual gibes and wisecracks. Clary and Squat grabbed hands. A sleep in the ice had not changed their relationship. Eyes roved old comrades, seeking remembered scars. Unmarked skin could say a lot about last time out.

They dressed in loose black shipboards and retrieved personals. Clad and inspected, Jo led them toward the briefing center. News of the day drifted back from earlier squads.

"Hanaver Strate is WarAvocat now."

"Wasn't he Chief of Staff? What year is it?"

"Year forty-three of the Deified Kole Marmigus. Strate got elected Dictat, too."

"One of the living? I thought the first requirement was you had to be Deified."

Colorless laughter.