The train pulled into Zakto Station a little after noon. Zakto was huge, echoing, crammed with people waiting, running, shouting, eating, buying, staring. Nolan counted ten other gates leading into the station and asked Kitrini to have it confirmed: Yes, trains left from Zakto to points all over Geldricht. In fact, the line into the city had been the last one built. Nolan knew he should not be surprised, but he was. He had always thought the train tracks had been laid primarily to link Gold Mountain with the city. Now he learned the indigo had been merely an afterthought.

“I’m sure,” Kitrini said, “that you would like to shower and make yourself presentable before you approach Chay Zanlan.”

“Yes,” Nolan said. “I don’t have much in the way of clothing choices with me, but is there something I shouldn’t wear? Some color or style?”

“No, but be sure and wear your fiancée’s medallion so he can see it.”

“All right, but why?”

“Because it’s a symbol he’ll recognize, and the gulden respect symbols. And it will do you no harm for Chay to instantly recognize you as a member of the Higher Hundred.”

“Very well. Thank you.”

They separated and headed for the showers. Nolan was getting used to the frank appraisal by the other men in the public rooms, though he still didn’t like it. It was not just his blue skin that attracted their attention, he had realized that almost immediately. They appraised each other just as openly, noting body size, muscle definition, probable strength, and possible sexual prowess. This was not something Kitrini had warned him about—but then, perhaps women did not eye each other with quite the same agenda. He didn’t know if it helped him or hurt him that he was slim, lean, and loose-limbed, whereas the naked gulden men in the showers beside him all seemed to be built of corded muscle wrapped around boxy bones. Would they be pleased that he offered them no physical threat, and thus leave him in peace, or would his vulnerability incite them to easy violence?

He made no conversation, no eye contact, and everyone left him alone. Oh, how he longed to be in the private, civilized world of Inrhio again.

He toweled himself off and dressed in the last clean clothes left in his luggage, wrinkled though they were. His hair had a tendency to spiral into wild curls if it wasn’t rigorously dried, and so he spent ten minutes alternately combing it and rubbing his scalp briskly with another towel. He shaved carefully—this was not the day to be sporting a sliver of dried blood—and brushed his teeth twice. He slipped Leesa’s medallion over his neck and took a moment to survey himself in the mirror.

Even to himself, in this place, he looked alien. How would Chay Zanlan receive him?