He meant to ask Colt or Pakt about the translations in the newspaper, but he never got a chance. When he returned to the office, Varella and Hiram and Sochin were huddled together, gazing fearfully down the hall toward Cerisa’s closed door. Nolan could catch the sound of raised voices but no distinct words.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” he demanded.

“Something to do with Colt,” Varella said. “Cerisa’s furious.”

“Is Pakt in there, too?”

“Yes, but he didn’t look too happy either.”

They knew nothing more by the time Melina returned, ten minutes later, but on her advice they all scattered to their own offices before Cerisa found them eavesdropping in the hall. So none of them could see exactly what happened when Cerisa’s door was flung open and angry footsteps went stomping down the hall. They heard Pakt call out, “No, wait!” and they heard the cool, liquid tones of Cerisa’s voice saying, “Don’t even try to stop him.”

And they all caught Colt’s voice, raised for the whole lab to hear, eerily calm and freighted with the singsong malevolence of a curse: “Dishonor to you. Dishonor to your family. May you be punished according to your crimes.”

Then more footsteps, quieter this time, and the sound of the outer door opening and falling shut. And then silence.

*   *   *

They had all been afraid to leave their offices for the rest of the day. Dread hung over the lab, seeped in under the closed doors, wound around their uneasy fingers, and made them clumsy at their keyboards. They all listened for the sound of Cerisa leaving, but the sound did not come, and so they felt tied to their own desks and computers until the final hour of the day. In silence, they left their offices, traded glances in the halls, and shrugged to indicate that they had no news. Even Melina, who could glean information from the most casually dropped word, could not guess what had transpired.

“Tomorrow,” she whispered to Nolan as they exited from the building. “Come early. We’ll ask Pakt.”

And so the next morning, Nolan arrived an hour early, to find Melina ahead of him by five minutes. Pakt was not in his office yet, but neither was Cerisa, so they settled themselves in Pakt’s chairs and waited.

“It must be bad,” Nolan said. “I don’t know much about it, but that dishonor thing sounded terrible.”

Melina nodded. “I don’t know much about it, either. I think it’s the worst thing you can wish on somebody.”

“Will Pakt tell us?”

“I don’t know.”