“To visit his son, Jex, who is in jail,” Pakt said, stating the obvious with exaggerated patience. They all knew Jex Zanlan was in jail. He had been arrested three months ago after setting off a bomb that had destroyed a medical compound near the West Two gate of the Centrifuge.

“And a damn good thing Jex Zanlan is in jail,” Melina retorted. “But does Chay Zanlan expect to negotiate his release with Ariana Bayless?”

“Ultimately,” Pakt said. “But I think Mayor Bayless and her council will make him sweat it out a little longer.”

“Why would she ever release him?” Varella asked. She was a paler, frailer version of Melina, not as smart, not as beautiful, not as lively. But likable nonetheless, Nolan always thought. “This gives her more leverage over Chay Zanlan than she’s ever had, and she’s within her rights to keep him. I mean, he did try to blow up the building.”

“Exactly. So if she gives him up, she’ll be able to expect a powerful return gift from Chay,” Pakt said.

“And any number of gifts spring to mind,” Colt added. “Foremost being rights to the Carbonnier Extension.”

“But not far behind is her desire to add a new ring to the Centrifuge,” Pakt said. “Chay could make her a gift of the construction stone, since it’s quarried in Geldricht. For that, Ariana Bayless just might release Jex Zanlan.”

Melina was shaking her head. “I will never understand politics,” she said. “How you can balance lives against commerce will always elude me. I could never make such a bargain.”

“Fortunately, Ariana Bayless is not so squeamish,” Pakt said dryly. “Chay, I am sure, is counting on it.”

“You keep calling him ‘Chay,’ ” Varella said a little irritably. “Do you actually know him?”

Colt was grinning. “It’s a gulden habit,” he said. “We have a very personal stake in our leader. We like to feel we could walk up to him any day and have a serious conversation with him, man to man.”

Melina gave Varella a significant look. “Not woman to man, you’ll notice.”

Colt gave an exaggerated shrug and spoke in an arrogant tone that was meant to annoy. “No gulden woman, no matter how schooled, would ever know as much as her husband, her brother, or her father.”

“Whereas my husband, brother, and father, all sitting together in one room, pooling their limited intellectual resources, would never have the ability to make a worthwhile decision in Inrhio,” Melina said loftily.

Pakt sent an amused sideways glance at Nolan. “Poor emasculated fools,” he said. “Letting their women cut them off at the balls.”