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And he sensed the sudden tension, and she saw complete understanding appear in his face as she twisted her head away from him. It’s wrong, it’s wrong . . . The well-bred Collegium girl, Maker’s niece, the enemy of the Empire, all shouting that reproach at her.

To the pits with the lot of you. She’d had enough of being haunted by herself, and it had been a long time, and she wanted this. She almost lunged at Thalric, arms dragging him down towards her again, feeling all those walls of propriety and repression shatter like glass. The two of them now fighting out of their clothes as though they were being reborn, a new stage of life – clutching at each other in something as much relief and catharsis as it was desire.

Che awoke in the chill hours before dawn, her back pressed against his warm chest, aware of hearing quiet movement nearby. With a start she sat up, fumbling for her sword hilt, but it was only Maure poking at the embers, trying to leach a little more warmth from the corpse of their fire. Thalric woke up with a growl, glared at the world balefully, then turned over, wrapping himself in the cloak, that had previously covered them both. On the far side of the fire, Varmen was snoring with a beehive drone.

Maure added some kindling to the fire, with obvious pessimism, but soon there were a few brave flames venturing forth, and she had quickly nurtured a steady little blaze. Seeing Che’s eyes still fixed on her, she retreated over to Varmen’s side of the fire, raising an eyebrow. On that invitation, Che carefully got to her feet and followed her, leaving Thalric to sleep alone.

‘My mystical intuition tells me you have questions,’ Maure said, with a slight smile, which only broadened when Che could not help glancing down at Varmen.

‘Thank the world for Apt men, hmm?’ said the halfbreed.

Che frowned at her, caught unawares. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘No? But surely you do,’ Maure corrected her. ‘I mean men to whom everything we are and do, the very world we live in, is a fiction. You don’t see the advantage in that? No questions, no requests, none of the reverence that’s equal parts fear and distrust. I thought that’s why you were with him.’ One finger indicated Thalric’s supine form.

‘No, that’s . . . complicated,’ Che replied, but even as she spoke she was thinking, And yet perhaps she’s closer to it than I give her credit for. Oh, it’s frustrating, sometimes, that he cannot understand, but still . . . would he stay with me, if he did?

‘Complicated, you can keep,’ Maure declared. ‘I like men to be simple. I’ve rolled the lucky dice with this one.’

Che nodded companionably, and felt almost guilty when she threw down, ‘And your reasons for travelling with us, they’re just as simple, are they?’

Maure paused, and her expression was both hurt and guilty. ‘That was uncalled for.’

‘You’re making Thalric nervous, the pair of you, and I can see why. He’s had plenty of people try to put a knife in his back, and he’s right that Varmen should be heading back east by now, and you should be going . . . wherever it is that you go. So tell me.’

‘Varmen’s reasons I don’t know, but I can guess.’ Maure’s eyes were downcast now. ‘He has a ghost on his shoulder. No surprise, you’d think, but most Wasps I ever met see the world in a way that paints everything they do with the Empire’s colours. No guilt, you see, and guilt lets the ghosts in like nothing else does. But then you knew that.’

She now caught Che’s eye, and for a moment the Beetle girl could not answer.

‘And you?’ she challenged at last. ‘Don’t ask me to believe you came running after us to save you from the brigands you’re obviously familiar with, or to get inside Varmen’s mail. Help me to trust you, Maure.’

The halfbreed mystic looked away again, her good humour ebbing and leaving her vulnerable again. ‘Ghosts, Cheerwell Maker . . . do you know what ghosts are?’

‘They’re . . .’ They’re what happens to us after we die? But that can’t be right.

Maure