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Chapters (50)
  1. Cover
  2. MARAUDER
  3. HISTORICAL ARCHIVES SUBSECTION C/5 category ALPHA
  4. ONE
  5. TWO
  6. THREE
  7. FOUR
  8. FIVE
  9. SIX
  10. SEVEN
  11. EIGHT
  12. NINE
  13. TEN
  14. ELEVEN
  15. TWELVE
  16. THIRTEEN
  17. FOURTEEN
  18. FIFTEEN
  19. SIXTEEN
  20. SEVENTEEN
  21. EIGHTEEN
  22. NINETEEN
  23. TWENTY
  24. TWENTY-ONE
  25. TWENTY-TWO
  26. TWENTY-THREE
  27. TWENTY-FOUR
  28. TWENTY-FIVE
  29. TWENTY-SIX
  30. TWENTY-SEVEN
  31. TWENTY-EIGHT
  32. TWENTY-NINE
  33. THIRTY
  34. THIRTY-ONE
  35. THIRTY-TWO
  36. THIRTY-THREE
  37. THIRTY-FOUR
  38. THIRTY-FIVE
  39. THIRTY-SIX
  40. THIRTY-SEVEN
  41. THIRTY-EIGHT
  42. THIRTY-NINE
  43. FORTY
  44. FORTY-ONE
  45. EPILOGUE
  46. TIME LINE
  47. SHOAL TRILOGY
  48. EVENTS FOLLOWING EMPIRE OF LIGHT AND PRECEDING MARAUDER
  49. Acknowledgements
  50. Also by Gary Gibson

Then you could have at least tried to protect me, replied Gabrielle, unable to keep the venom out of her voice. But instead you left me alone with him.

With Petrova? Cassanas stared at her. But you

I meant with Thijs, hissed Gabrielle. You could have told him no, that he had to leave . . . but instead you did nothing.

Gabrielle watched the old womans face as comprehension finally dawned there. How was I to know that he would?

How could you not know? Gabrielle cried. I remember the look on your face then! You knew . . . you knew why he was there. And yet you still let him in. You never once tried to protect me from him, not once.

Cassanas swallowed a great gulp of air, in the manner of someone drowning, before she replied. I took care of you as if you were my own daughter, she gasped, her voice growing husky. I fed you from my own breast when you were a baby. I

Get out.

I taught you how to read and

I said get out!

Gabrielle screamed these last words at the top of her lungs. She kept shrieking them until Cassanas backed away running out through the door, with the same two words still pouring out of Gabrielles throat like the shriek of a wounded animal.

FIVE

Megan

2751 (twelve years before)

The first time Megan had ever heard of the Wanderer was on the command deck of the Beauregard a Kjregrnnested-registered exploration vessel in orbit above that same world where she sat ensconced within the folded-up steel petals of the ships astrogation chair.

<Valentin. Theres a cargo pod requesting rendezvous with us,> she observed. <Who the hells responsible for sending it up here?>

Although Valentin the merchant officer in charge of supervising the final maintenance checks before the Beauregard was handed over to the Accord was hidden from her actual view, she could see and hear him perfectly well via her ship-linked senses.

Thus she saw Valentin reach out to a console, information rippling under his touch. One or two other members of the skeleton crew assigned to this final check-over were moving here and there around the command deck, in order to supervise last-minute drive and systems diagnostics.

Looks like a standard supply shipment, he replied, his voice sounding flat and echoless as it was fed directly into her auditory nerves. Seems a little weird that theyd be sending it up now, though.

<Theres nothing standard about it. Thats one of the supply pods we use when were gearing up for a deep-space expedition.>

Ill check the authorization. He paused, the data before him flickering into a new configuration. Well, whatever it is, its highest priority. Orders direct from Ladested: dont look, dont touch.