She hurries away.

Rubbing at the pain in my chest that seems to come from within and without, I follow.

* * *

The sun is setting and across the endless stretch of the Barrens every rock casts a distorted shadow. Silas stealthily lights his pipe, taking advantage of Falco’s temporary absence from the flight deck, and my eyes are heavy with the bitter smoke. The light drips like hot honey through the windshield to where I sit, a battered almanac in my lap.

It’s only five years old, but might as well have come from another century. In it, there is an article about Factus, filled with alluring pictures of majestic sand dunes and spectacular sunsets, an image showing the vibrant, free-wheeling architecture of Otroville’s main street. Is this what had drawn Silas here, from his safe, comfortable, enclosed life on Jericho?

I let out a breath of laughter, turning the page. What the article does not mention is that the buildings in the photograph of Otroville are not real; just facades stuck to the front of container stacks, Accord propaganda built to reassure new arrivals. Anyone arriving at the port these days can see right through them, literally, to the grit-blasted metal beneath. Neither does it mention the Market of the Innocents – a gauntlet run between port and town – where quick tongues and nimble fingers wait, ready to strip any new arrivals bare as they gasp, dizzy and sick from the lack of oxygen. It fails to mention how Accord disbursements go missing, how aid drops arrive gnawed to the bone, skimmed by every hand they pass through, until there is barely anything left. And lastly, it fails to mention the simple fact that – when it comes to Factus – the Accord are too far away to care. In that one respect at least, the Free Limits were right all along; a whole system is too much for a single power to govern.

From somewhere in the ship comes talk and the occasional thump; the General, Peg and Falco sparring in the hold.

‘Again,’ I hear Falco say, over the blare of raucous music.

‘Show me the other one,’ the General asks. ‘The eye-gouging.’

‘Not until you have this one learned.’

‘I know it already!’

There’s a scuffle of footsteps then a heavy thud.

‘That was cheating,’ the General complains. ‘I wasn’t ready. Try it again, I’ll show you a move I learned from a brawler from Delos—’

‘Enough for now. You should rest.’

‘No!’

‘Yes. You’re tired.’

‘I am not.’

Smiling to myself, I look across, studying Silas’s profile. The golden light brings out the warmth of his skin, and the saturated blue-black of his hair. He looks over, catches my eye, and smiles.

A second later the ship lurches sideways, almost throwing me from the seat. Instantly, the drowsiness is gone, replaced by alarm.

‘What’s going on?’