The woman who answered the door was a tall, beautiful, tawny-skinned woman about Melina’s age. She had the longest, thickest gold hair that Nolan had ever seen and eyes the color of amber. She looked terrified to see them. She seemed to want to crouch behind the door to hide as much of herself as possible, and her flustered greeting was incomprehensible.

Melina stepped forward and spoke in her usual brisk voice. “I’m Melina Lurio, this is Nolan Adelpho. We come from the Biolab in the city. Is Colt here?”

The woman stared at them, her eyes growing even wider. Her hands appeared to tighten on the edge of the door. “Colt?” she repeated and then asked a question in an unfamiliar language.

“Oh, for heaven’s sake, she can’t speak bluetongue,” Melina said, her voice a mix of frustration and disbelief. “How can anybody live in this city and not bother to learn the language?”

“Maybe she never ventures out of the neighborhood,” Nolan said. “Maybe she’s just moved here.”

“What do you suppose she is to Colt? Sister? Wife? Lover?”

“He doesn’t have a wife. As far as I know.”

“I suppose it doesn’t matter what her connection to him is. Listen, young lady,” Melina said. She switched to a slow, emphatic tone of voice and asked a question in a set of words Nolan could not understand.

“I didn’t know you spoke goldtongue!” he exclaimed.

“I don’t. Just enough to ask if anyone here speaks our language. I had to learn a few phrases when I did a summer internship at a clinic in the Lost City. I can say some other choice words, too, like ‘fever’ and ‘broken bone,’ but I don’t think any of those will help us now.”

The gulden woman had nodded vigorously and replied at length in her own language, but Melina flung up a hand to cut her off. She repeated her request and then assumed an impatient, imperious pose. The woman spoke again, a little more briefly, then disappeared into the recesses of the house.

“Is she coming back?” Nolan asked.

“I have no idea.”

But she did return, less than five minutes later, followed by a boy who appeared to be about fourteen. He was tall and gangly, awkward for his height; his face looked incomplete, as if he had not yet mastered all its expressions. But there was an indefinable arrogance to his carriage, an incipient self-assurance that made it clear he couldn’t imagine what blueskins were doing at his door and he hoped he would not have to deal with them for long.

“Can you speak bluetongue?” Melina demanded.

He looked down at her out of mint-green eyes and visibly wondered at her manners. “There is a woman at my door speaking the indigo language,” he said, pronouncing the words with a perfect accent. “Is that why I was called here?”