Mordach. Zidarov nearly refused. What was there to tell the man, now? That it had all been a sordid mistake, and that he ought to sort out his own grubby family troubles without ­involving the law? Did this count as dropping his enquiries, as he’d indicated to Vermida? Maybe, maybe not. Still, even if this was all done bar the shooting, there were still things he’d like to know, and Mordach might be able to tell him them.

‘Complying,’ he replied, swinging the Luxer round as the coordinates came in. ‘Did he say what it was about?’

‘Negative. I’ll tell him you’re on your way.’

The loc-ref wasn’t to the building he’d met him in before. Zidarov soon realised the reference was a long way out – halfway towards the coast, where the land dropped sharply and extended out in grey, drear emptiness for miles in every direction. After a while, the built-up cityscape gave out entirely, exposing tracts of flat rockcrete studded with brush. A few habi­tations dotted the horizon, here and there, their windows all facing away from the city behind them. The rain was steady and miserable, turning everything a saturated black. He began to detect something briny in the air. The road became pitted and poorly maintained.

It took an hour or so more driving before his location appeared in the viewscreen ahead – an outcrop of dark basalt, rising from the flatlands around, crowned with a homestead of some sort. It was an elaborate place, all towers and gates, built from the same black stone as its foundations. It looked old, but probably wasn’t. It had the air of a place designed to hark back to a past that few people on Alecto really remembered.

Zidarov drove up a long and winding path, circling around the outcrop’s lower skirts, before reaching a driveway where three groundcars were already parked. The gale had picked up, and flurries of rain skipped across an open balcony. The house rose up above him in steep terraces. It was big – there must have been more than twenty dorm-chambers inside, and Zidarov could see a turbine-copter pad mounted near the summit.

He got out, and was stung by the bite of the wind. He hurried into cover, and soon found himself in front of two large brass-fronted doors, each with the Terashova leonine crest embossed in the centre. Before he could locate a summon-chime, the doors were opened by the same uniformed man he had seen in ­Urgeyena – the one with the metal hand.

‘He’s expecting you,’ the man said, and showed him in.

Zidarov went inside, running his hand quickly through his wet hair. The interior of the place was spartan, with hardwood floors and bare white walls. A few bronze sculptures stood on pedestals here and there, but otherwise it was all austere, ­ruthlessly clean.