Between Machine Gun and Papers, Please, Cyril looked small and wilting. Sweat shone on his face despite the bitter cold. He stumbled on the threshold.

“Thank you, Ereni, Milosz,” said the sergeant. “That’s all.”

Another double salute. Another ring of boots on boards. Cyril flinched. Aristide did not reach out to him, though without the guards supporting him on either side he looked liable to drop into a dead faint.

“Welcome to Tatié, Mr. Wallis,” said the sergeant.

Cyril glared at Aristide. “You could have rotten warned me. I thought I was going to be arrested.”

“I told you I had it sorted. But I’ll admit I wasn’t sure how it would play out.”

“Friends all up and down the ladder, still.” Cyril shook his head, wiped grit from his eyes. The skin of his face looked delicate with exhaustion, liable to tear.

“Not really my friends,” said Aristide. “More friends of Vasily Memmediv. And, in a way, Cordelia.”

“Do I want to know how that story goes?”

“Perhaps at a later date.”

“I hope you two weren’t going to take a train to Dastya, too,” said the sergeant. “The tracks turn into twisted metal about fifty miles outside Kareniv.”

“Damnation,” said Aristide. “I don’t suppose it’s safe to lift a thumb?”

She laughed. “That depends on who picks you up.” Then, checking her watch, “I’ll tell you what. There’s a supply convoy leaving Eré this evening for the front, and I’ve got a couple of messengers who are supposed to catch it. They’re due to leave town in half an hour, and I’m sure there’s some room in the back of a jeep for friends of friends.”

“And once we get to the front?”

The sergeant shrugged. “You seem like a man who knows how to improvise.”

At nine o’clock in the evening, Lillian and Daoud sat outside the Icepick in her car, watching the door. She daren’t go into a building packed with so many hungry paperfolk and radio personalities, but in the dark, between the streetlamps, she could stay anonymous while waiting for the particular anchor she required.

It also gave her a private moment to ask, “Do you think they’re all right?”

Daoud shrugged, staring out the windshield. “How can I guess? They made it out of the city, I assume. And by now…” He looked at his watch and she saw him consider several ends to his sentence before discarding them and lapsing into silence.

Kostos came out of the tower at a quarter past nine, coat open and scarf crooked. The evening was unseasonably warm. Lillian stepped out of the car and intercepted him as he crossed the street.

“Laurie Kostos?” she asked, extending her hand as she approached. He eyed her suspiciously, but she forced the issue without letting her smile falter, and he shook.