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They didn’t try to speak again as the flyer strained toward its destination, leaving the slower politic flyer further and further behind. When they began to ascend Mount Clement, the vibration intensified, and a dreadful tearing noise filled the cabin.

‘Slow!’ Fariss bellowed.

‘Reduce speed!’ said Thales.

The command came too late. A large piece of fairing peeled off the nose and smashed into the passenger bubble. The bubble cracked under the impact, and a blasting gust of cold air speared through the cabin.

‘Engine malfunction alert,’ blared the flyer.

The dashboard flashed a sequence of lights that meant nothing to Thales. ‘Land!’ he shrieked.

Their descent was swift and ragged. For a few desperate moments Thales thought they’d hit nose first, but the vehicle corrected its wing balance in time to drop tail first. The impact was so hard that Fariss’s lap restraint snapped, and her lower body was flung forward. Only the shoulder restraint prevented her from smashing her head.

Thales’s neck jerked back and then forward. As he gasped for breath, Fariss was already wriggling out of her shoulder harness and kicking the door open.

She released Thales from his restraint and pulled him into her arms as though he was a small child being rescued by its mother.

‘Where to?’ She didn’t put him down as she slid onto the ground.

Through his daze he noticed grease on her face and the spatter of blood that ran from her high broad cheekbone down to her generous mouth. There was no smile on those lips. They were pursed with pain and determination.

He remembered how easily she’d strangled Lasper Farr’s soldier on Edo, the one sent to kill him. And then later how she’d shot the mercenary, Macken, when she’d caught him forcing himself on Thales. When Fariss decided to kill, she showed no hesitation. Or remorse.

He shook in her arms.

‘Thales!’ she demanded. ‘We stay here, and they’ll be all over us. Where to?’

He raised his head and tried to get his bearings. They’d landed on a commuter siding near the mouth of the quarry. Thales knew the area vaguely. His father had brought him here once, hoping his son might choose a less lofty position than scholar. He still recalled their conversation – his father’s resignation and acknowledgement of his mother’s genes.

‘You must know what it means to work for a living, Thales. Sometimes I think they forget. Those up there, with their ideas.’ He stared into the distance towards the city. It was then that Thales had felt the yearning to go there and become one of the untouchables. The pull had been so, so strong.

‘Follow the escarpment. Town’s over the other side,’ he whispered.

Fariss strode on without another word.

He tugged her shoulder and made her look at him. ‘I can walk,’ he said. ‘Put me down.’

She gave a nod and dropped him to his feet. ‘Shame. Kinda enjoy doin’ that.’

Another warm feeling infused his hurting body. She could still do that to him despite everything.

They headed up the side of the quarry toward the treeline. Thales found himself jogging to keep up with her. The brush at the top was thick, slowing their progress. Halfway along the escarpment, he begged Fariss for a rest. She stood impatiently over him as he sank into the dry grass, panting.

The politic flyer made several passes over the quarry before settling to land near their discarded flyer. Guards poured out.

She grabbed Thales by the arm and pulled him to his feet. ‘Get your arse moving, or I’ll be carrying you again.’

Staying under the cover of the trees, they crested the quarry. Beneath them, Clementvale spread through the hollow, between the quarry and another heavily wooded mountain on the opposite side, proof of what the area had been like before its excavation.

‘Cat-cons – are – down – there,’ Thales gasped. He pointed to a discoloured section of the uniformly white catoplasma rooftops. ‘If she’s a worker, she’ll live there.’

‘How will we find her?’

‘Ask – someone.’

Fariss nodded. ‘Come on.’ She gripped his