He’d been picked up during one of the first of Vongella’s wave of raids. Lucky, perhaps, not to have been killed among all the flying bullets, though Zidarov guessed he wasn’t feeling so lucky now.

On his return from the raid, Zidarov took his time. He went to his cell and checked for any urgent messages. There was one from Lena Vasteva, which he didn’t read. There were a few bits and pieces coming in for the Terashova case, but nothing yet from Cuo. There were assorted leads and complaints and requests for assistance from other enforcers. He replied to some of those, deferred others, junked a few.

He went and poured himself some caffeine, and grabbed something to eat. He felt musty and unclean, but didn’t fancy using the pulse-showers in the department – he’d wait until he got back to his hab. He wondered if Milija was feeling better disposed by now. It would make life easier if she were. Naxi would be home soon. That would be a reckoning, of a sort, one way or another.

It was all giving him a headache. He ate badly – all refined sucrose, processed carbs. He felt aches, all the time, and not just from that scar. He liked the pain from that scar. It was like a friend, an annoying friend, but one who you’d miss if he went away.

Eventually, he ambled down to the holding cells. To get there, you had to descend three levels, and then walk through the chasteners’ domain. Even the air felt caustic, down there. No one liked lingering in those corridors, with the stains that somehow resisted every attempt to bleach them out, and the cries that echoed from the barred, windowless chambers. If you passed a chastener in the corridor, one of those wearing the long black coat with the emotion-suppresser coil at the nape of their neck, you didn’t salute or give the His Hand greeting. You kept your head down. You kept on walking.

Past the windowless cells were the regular holding cells. They had been positioned so that occupants would hear plenty of what was going on above them. That acted as a softener all of its own. Zidarov had come down there sometimes, opened a door, only to find an inmate begging to talk. Once or twice, if the duty guards had been careless, they’d already cut their wrists. That made everyone angry – a waste of time and resources.