“There’s another thing I’m thinking about you,” she said softly. “Can you guess it?”

All too well.

With reluctance, he broke her gaze and looked at the pad. “Yes. You are thinking that I should talk Ranette into lending you a rifle. I agree. While I do think that it would be wise of you to train with a revolver eventually, I’d rather you spend this particular encounter with a weapon you use well. Maybe we can find a rifle that will fit those aluminum rounds Wayne grabbed.”

“Oh. Of course.”

Waxillium pretended not to notice her embarrassment.

“I think,” Marasi said, “that I’ll go check on Wayne and Ranette.”

“Good idea. Hopefully she hasn’t discovered that he took one of her guns to trade.”

Marasi withdrew, walking to the door in haste.

“Lady Marasi?” Waxillium called.

She hesitated at the door, turning, hopeful.

“You did a good job of reading me,” he said, nodding in respect. “Not many can do that. I’m not known to be free with my emotions.”

“Advanced interrogation techniques class,” she said. “And… uh, I’ve read your psychological profile.”

“I have a psychological profile?”

“Yes, I’m afraid. Doctor Murnbru wrote it after his visit to Weathering.”

“That little rat Murnbru was a psychologist?” Waxillium said, genuinely baffled. “I was sure he was a gambling cheat, passing through town looking for marks to swindle.”

“Er, yes. That’s in the profile. You, uh, have a tendency to think anyone who wears too much red is a chronic gambler.”

“I do?”

She nodded.

“Damn,” he said. I’m going to need to read that thing.

She left and pulled the door closed. He turned back to his plan once again. He raised his hand and slipped his earring into his ear. He was supposed to wear it when praying, or when doing something of great import.

He figured that tonight, he’d be doing a lot of both.

16

Wayne hobbled through the railway station, supporting himself on his brown cane, walking with a slow, intentionally frail step. There was quite a crowd pushing and shoving one another and gawking at the train up ahead. A group of them surged to the side, nearly toppling him.

Everyone was standing up so tall. That gave Wayne—back bent with age—no hope of seeing what the fuss was about. “No thought for a poor elderly woman,” Wayne grumbled. A gravelly tone, nasal and higher-pitched than his normal voice, mixed with a nice Margothian District accent. The district no longer existed, at least not in the same way; it had been consumed by the industrial quarter of its octant, its residents moving away. A dying accent for a dying woman. “No respect at all. A travesty, I tell you. Plain and simple, that’s what it is.”

A few youths in the crowd in front glanced back at him, taking in his ancient coat—it went down to his ankles—his face furrowed with age, his silvery hair beneath a felt cap. “Sorry, ma’am,” one of them finally said, making way for him.