‘You need to mend things with your brother,’ Cira insisted. ‘If you think Medoro’s going to do Pio’s job for you, his sister might have another opinion.’

Agata grimaced. ‘Medoro’s a friend! Is there anything going on in your head that isn’t about reproductive strategies?’

‘Someone has to think about these things.’ Cira peered suspiciously at Agata’s console, as if the images of phase-space flows on display might reveal the true source of her daughter’s intransigence. ‘If you value your work, you should value your brother.’

‘Really?’

‘Why do you think I had a son at all? It was for your benefit, not mine.’

Agata was chilled. ‘Whatever my differences with Pio, at least I don’t think of him as some kind of useful machine.’

‘You can take all the holin you like, and it will never give you certainty,’ Cira said bluntly. ‘But no woman who’s shed a child has ever divided afterwards. If you try to raise a child on your own, it will cost you years away from your research. This is what men are for. Argue politics with Pio as much as you like, but to alienate him completely would be self-defeating.’

Agata said, ‘He tried to stop the turnaround. It’s gone beyond arguing politics.’

Cira spread her hands in a gesture of agnosticism. ‘There was no evidence connecting him to that. And I would have thought you’d be troubled by this whole notion of “preventative detention”.’

In truth, Agata was divided. That the Council had empowered itself to imprison people without trial disturbed her, but she’d almost convinced herself that the Peerless’s vulnerable transition state justified the move. Pio and the other migrationist leaders were being treated well enough; three years in comfortable accommodation, free to read and study, wasn’t exactly torture.

‘If you won’t visit him, you can still do right by him,’ Cira suggested.

‘What do you mean?’

‘If you had a child, I don’t believe they’d keep her from her uncle.’

Agata was appalled. ‘Now you want my daughter to be raised in prison?’

‘Only for a couple of stints,’ Cira assured her. ‘After that, we’d have grounds to ask for his early release. If he’s looking after a child, what harm can he do? They can still monitor him, but it would be absurd to keep him locked up.’

Agata’s head was throbbing. ‘You’re unbelievable!’

‘Do this for him now,’ Cira replied, ‘and he’s sure to be so grateful that he’ll happily raise a son as well. Then the next generation will be complete. You owe that to your daughter: to give her the opportunities I gave you.’

Agata said, ‘I’m going to the party. You’re welcome to join me—’

‘To commune with the ancestors?’ Cira hummed contemptuously.

‘To remember what we’re here for,’ Agata countered.

Cira said, ‘We’re here to survive, and to strengthen our position.’

‘You mean manipulate each other, and preserve the status quo?’

‘Your grandmother lived under the old rules,’ Cira reminded her. ‘Starving wasn’t an eccentric choice then; it was forced on every woman in the mountain. If you’d listened to her more, you might not be so complacent.’