“Yeah. What was it all about?”

“Don’t ask.”

“I’m asking.”

In a far corner, someone lit an oil lantern. The glow was thin but comforting.

Rubio lifted his head to cough, then slumped back against the wall. Even in dim light, I could see bruises coloring up on his pale skin. “Seems it was my fault the raid went wrong.”

I groaned.

He rolled his head my way. “You don’t sound surprised.”

“It’s all over the den. I went looking to warn you before I went out.”

“But why would I do that?”

“That’s what I said. But it’s . . . some of the stuff you say? People take it wrong.”

Rubio sniffed. “What, only Rousseau can have ideas?”

“I’m only saying.”

He shook his head. “So fucking stupid, all of them.”

“What should we do about it?”

“Do?”

“I mean, that’s twice. What if they come after you again?”

“Then you’ll just have to rescue me again.” He grinned weakly. “By my count, you still owe me.”

Our friendship had grown out of his scaring off some bully girls in the tier, my first weeks out of the Ward. Didn’t take much. A serious scowl usually sent them packing. But I was grateful that anyone would stand up for me.

“It’s time to tell Rousseau.”

He ran a hand across his forehead. Fresh blood gleamed on his fingertips. He looked old. “Maybe it was his idea.”

“No way. He has a beef, he tells you straight.” Like he had with me.

“Maybe. But his boyos are dead sure they’re doing him a favor.”

We sat for a while, breathing deep. Now I could do more than react to whatever immediate crisis, my brain was filling up like a mob had moved in, fighting for space and attention: papers, old book, hide-hole, Storm Worshippers, arrows? And Daniel, in my thoughts more than I cared to admit. Ghosting huge above it all, like a faded wall mural: the woman behind my eyelids.

“Hey, Rube?”

He was fighting off a coughing fit. “What?”

“Where’s Arkadia?”

“Where’s what?”

“Arkadia. Did I say it right?”

“Sure, but it isn’t anywhere. It’s a myth.”

“It’s not a place?”

“Well, it was a place, in Ancient Greece, out in the boonies. Later it got to be a symbol of the ideal simple life, the rural utopia. Et in Arcadia ego. Why?”

“So it’s not a real place now?”

“Plenty places named after it. Towns and such. But the symbolic meaning’s what’s important.”

Only to you, I thought. “Does it matter how it’s spelled?”

“It’s spelled a bunch of ways, depending on whether you’re using the Latin source or some later corruption.”

“Did you know there was a Mars base named after it?”

“Where’d you hear that?”

“Peeto was looking at it online.”

“Peeto. Figures. Any more off-the-wall inquiries?”

“Just one.”

“Ummm?”