‘There are others like you?’ Ysbel said.

‘It has been a very long time since I left my brothers and sisters, and I do not know if they are alive or dead,’ Seven said. ‘You may be looking at the last of my kind.’

‘They aren’t dead,’ Raia said. ‘We just haven’t found them yet.’

‘Raia believes that you and your little companion can help us,’ Seven told Ysbel.

His smile showed sharp incisors as long as her thumb. He was a head taller than her, more than twice Goodwill’s height, his body long and sinuous, his legs relatively short, his dark blond pelt dusted with a shimmer of auburn. Overlapping necklaces of snail shells and nut hulls hung from his long muscular neck. He spoke the common tongue fluently, with just a trace of a lisp, asking Raia if she had brought the gifts he had requested.

‘Everything’s here,’ Raia said, and unhooked the bag from her pack and set it on the ground. Seven squatted over it, his patchwork cloak puddling around him, and tipped out the items Zaquil had printed or sourced from the hopper’s supplies. A torch with a squeeze generator. A medical kit. A water bottle with a variety of filters, including one that could turn saltwater to fresh. A multibladed knife. Fish hooks. The bear’s hands were huge and his blunt fingers were tipped with thick claws, but he picked through his prizes with deft speed, holding up a pack of needles and telling Ysbel and Goodwill that he made all his clothes.

‘I tan animal pelts and skins with urine and make them supple with brains mashed in saltwater, and sew them with gut thread and grass to make the seams waterproof. Ever since my escape I have had to live off the land as best I can.’

Ysbel said, ‘And before that, before you escaped, you were living in the camp by the river. What can you tell us about it?’

Seven poured the gifts back into the bag and stood, start-lingly swift and fluid. ‘Raia told me your story, so I suppose it is only fair that I tell you mine.’

‘I’d love to hear it,’ Ysbel said.

‘What about you, little one?’ Seven said to Goodwill. ‘I understand why you are afraid of me, but as you can see, I am not like other bears.’

‘I don’t like being tricked,’ Goodwill said.

He was standing behind Ysbel and Raia, wary and watchful. Ysbel shared his unease. Bears were crazy killers. Everyone knew that. And Seven was strong and quick, could overpower and unseam her in a moment. Even so, she believed that his theatrical manner masked something tender, vulnerable. You may be looking at the last of my kind.