Even Nolan had heard of renegade blueskin anthropologist Anton Solvano; in fact, Pakt had mentioned the name just the other day. “She’s a disgrace because she’s Solvano’s daughter? That’s not really her fault, is it?”

“That isn’t, no. But she’s also chosen to become Jex Zanlan’s mistress.”

Nolan couldn’t help himself; he pivoted on one foot to look back at the girl who had huddled so miserably on the floor. But she was nowhere in sight. “That’s incredible,” he said.

Melina shrugged. “True, though. She never makes an attempt to deny it. They say her family is completely mortified by the situation, but they haven’t disinherited her. Yet. Which you have to give them credit for, because surely the temptation must be strong.”

Nolan resumed walking toward the lab, Melina beside him. “Guess she won’t be at Corzehia’s ball, though,” he said.

Melina laughed so hard she almost couldn’t catch her breath. “No,” she said at last, “I guess she won’t.”

*   *   *

Two days later, she told him more about Kitrini Candachi. They were drinking their first cups of coffee in Melina’s office and celebrating the calm that had descended upon the city with Chay Zanlan’s departure. The thought of Chay Zanlan had reminded Nolan of Jex, which had reminded him of the dark, despairing woman he had spoken to so briefly.

“Tell me about her,” he said to Melina. “How did she even get to know Jex Zanlan?”

“What do you know about the Solvanos? Her father and her grandfather?”

“Not much. I think they’re mid-caste or high-caste but not Higher Hundred. They did some famous studies in anthropology.”

“Right. Well, her grandfather, Casen Solvano, was this brilliant but sort of demented scholar who went off to live with the gulden when he was a young man. This was fifty or sixty years ago, you understand, when the city was maybe a third of the size it is now. There were very few gulden in the city, and most of them were the engineering specialists who had only agreed to come in because they were paid a great deal of money. The gulden built the city, you know—the indigo didn’t have the technology for it. The gulden were the architects and the engineers, and that’s what really gave them a foothold in the city.”

“This is like talking to Pakt,” Nolan said. “Always some kind of history lesson.”

“Well, you asked.”

“I asked about her.”