“When I was very little,” she continues, “the city Arbiters gave our mining equipment concession to another Gen. I never understood why, or how those things work. But one day we lived in a big, fancy keep tower in a big, fancy cooperative in the Circus, and the next day Gen Fan lost its franchise and was dissolved.”

Dyeawan frowns. “I’m so sorry, Riko.”

She shrugs, more concerned with angling the hanging mirrors just right.

“It’s nothing next to what you’ve been through, yeah? Anyway. My father opened a small shop in the tinker’s quarter. Only he drank too much to fix anything most days. So… I started doing it. And I found out I was really good at it, fixing things. Didn’t matter what someone brought in, I could take it apart and put it back together better than when it was new.”

Dyeawan grins. “That doesn’t surprise me.”

“I tried to keep it a secret. I didn’t want anyone to know it wasn’t my father doing the work. But somehow… Edger knew. A woman dressed like that horrible Oisin who skulks around the levels of the keep, all in black, came and took me from the shop. She brought me here. Edger showed me what the Cadre does and asked if I wanted to stay and be part of it. It was hard to leave my father behind, but… he wasn’t himself anymore. He hadn’t been for a long time.”

Riko takes a deep breath, and Dyeawan senses that’s all she wishes to say about that.

“But you’re happy here,” Dyeawan says.

The smile returns to Riko’s face, and she nods. “I am. I love it here. I love every day that I get to make something or test something. And now you’re here!”

The implication is so genuine that Dyeawan feels a lump rising in her throat, though she doesn’t say anything.

Riko curses under her breath.

“What is it?” Dyeawan asks.

She doesn’t answer at first. Riko is busy studying the shadows cast by the light hitting her sundial. Instead of one darkened sliver moving over its face, there are several.

“It’s not working,” Riko says. “Maybe the mirrors are calibrated wrong… or maybe it just isn’t possible to measure time so precisely using the position of the sun.”

“Can I help?”

Riko grunts. “You’ve got enough problems to solve. I don’t know. Maybe a sundial is too simple. Maybe… I don’t know… maybe the solution is metallurgic. Something with gears? I’ll keep working on it.”

“You’ll figure it out,” Dyeawan assures her.

Riko smiles down at her. “And what about you? Is staring at this thing getting you any closer to the answer?”

Dyeawan sighs. “No. Not at all.”