Jory opened his mouth to protest, but stopped and nodded reluctantly.

“If it ever came out that you completed a contract and then uncompleted it,” he said, “that’s your Adventure Society membership gone. Mine too, for that matter, just for knowing about it.”

“We do have some room to move,” Jason said. “For one thing, the contract calls for the capture of a thief, not thieves. We caught them both because we were being thorough, but now we know they’re friends, we can cut Belinda loose.”

Jory let out a sigh of relief, although he still had stress to spare.

“I’m having Clive bring Belinda here,” Jason explained, “because I don’t want her running around causing trouble before I have a solid plan in place.”

“So, what is the plan?”

“We have to hand Sophie in,” Jason said. “That’s something we just have to accept. I’m going to need you to convince her friend not to do anything stupid. You need to keep them both here, without them running, while I fill in the gaps in the political landscape. Once I know how everything fits together, we can work something out.”

“Like what?”

“Have you ever read the service agreement between the city and the Adventure Society?”

“Of course I haven’t.”

“It has some interesting provisions,” Jason said. “Until I understand the political context, though, I’m stumbling in the dark. When Clive gets here with Belinda, just try and keep a lid on things until I get back.”

“Get back? Where are you going?”

“To get some context,” Jason said. “Do you know where Dorgan lives?”

“Dorgan? As in, the crime lord, Dorgan?”

“That’s the one.”

“Are you insane?”

“Probably,” Jason said. “I heard the Big Three all live pretty large, so it can’t be that hard to find.”

“They all live in the canal district,” Jory said. “Safe and neutral territory because of the Island interests that operate out of there. I don’t think wandering into his compound is a good idea.”

“Come on, Jory. Where’s your sense of adventure?”

“Where’s your sense of self-preservation?”

Jory groaned.

“Look who I'm asking,” he said. “The day we met, you picked a fight with a couple of priests and got knocked out cold. Fine. All of the Big Three live in huge compounds that used to belong to families who moved to the Island. Go to the Cavendish side of the canal district and look for the big walls with the big guards at the big gate.”

“Thanks,” Jason said. “I’ll be back soon.”

“If you live,” Jory muttered.

* * *

No one knew how physically vast the astral space supplying water to the desert was, as it had never been mapped. The goal of the expedition was to find whatever was causing the apertures to become unreliable. They found the closest stable aperture within the thickest cluster of unstable ones and had gone through.