Then she shot the crossbow. The bolt hit me in the sternum – she’d found the middle of me, even with the armour – but it wasn’t any worse than a sharp tap from a finger and the bolt didn’t penetrate. I raised my own crossbow and gave her a bolt in return, nailing her right in the visor. The bolt punctured the glass, but it didn’t get her in the face. She reached up, touched the bolt where it was embedded, thought better of tugging it out, and surged towards me like she had springs on her heels. She had a sword of her own, the curved blade as black and shiny as her suit.

I pushed the Ghostie blade ahead of me. We closed the distance between each other, her sword chopping through the lungstuff like she was trying to find something in fog. I met it with the Ghostie and sliced it clean through, leaving her with just the handle and a little stump of sword jutting from it. She could still do damage with that, but I was quicker. I jabbed the Ghostie right into her chest, and then pulled up as I drew it out. I took it down to the hilt, imagining the invisible blade cutting its way out of the back of her like a fin made of glass.

The length of the blade was crimson when I glanced at it. But it drank the blood just as thirstily as the armour.

That was when I felt something press against the back of my noggin.

‘Drop it,’ a voice shouted through glass and lungstuff so that I got the gist of it well enough.

If it was a crossbow muzzle, it was pressing against the hair on the back of my head, not against any part of the armour. No matter what you might think, something like that can have a very persuasive effect. I let go of the blade, and allowed the crossbow to slide out of my other hand.

I heard a hiss, like the seal on a helmet being released. Then the glassy whirr of a visor going up into a helmet, the way ours don’t.

The voice was clearer now.

‘You gave it a good go, with that armour.’ The voice was a man’s, but quite high in its pitch, and better spoken than I’d been expecting. ‘All you’ve done is given Bosa something else for her money. She’s been after Ghostie gubbins for years, and now she’s got it all on a plate. Thought you could give her the jump, did you?’

‘I didn’t think anything,’ I said.