back into the matrix. Maybe it was never totally disconnected — there could have been a filament of nuclear matter a single quark wide stretching all the way from the marble back to the edge of the system, and we’d never have known it.’ ‘Go back a bit. What happened after you left Hades? Did Ilia come with you?’ ‘No. She was never mapped into the matrix. But she survived and we met up again in orbit around Hades, inside Nostalgia for Infinity . The logical thing to have done would have been to get away from this system, a long way away, but it wasn’t happening. The ship was, well, not exactly damaged, but changed. It had suffered a kind of psychotic episode. It didn’t want to have any further dealings with the external universe. It was all we could do to get it back to the inner system, within an AU of Resurgam.’ ‘Hm.’ Thorn had his chin propped on his knuckle. ‘This gets better, it really does. The odd thing is, I actually think you might be telling the truth. If you were going to lie, you’d at least come up with something that made sense.’ ‘It does make sense, you’ll see.’ She told him the rest of it, Thorn listening quietly and patiently, nodding occasionally and asking her to clarify certain aspects of her story. She told him that everything they had already told him about the Inhibitors was the truth in so far as they knew it, and that the threat was as real as they had claimed. ‘That much I think you’ve convinced me of,’ Thorn said. ‘Sylveste brought them down, unless they were already on their way here. That’s why he might still feel some obligation to protect us, or at least take a passing interest in the external universe. The thing around Hades was a kind of trigger, we think. Sylveste knew there was risk in what he did, but he didn’t care.’ Khouri scowled, feeling a surge of anger. ‘Fucking arrogant scientist. I was supposed to kill him, you know. That’s why I was on that ship in the first place.’ ‘Another delicious complication.’ He nodded approvingly. ‘Who sent you?’ ‘A woman from Chasm City. Called herself the Mademoiselle. She and Sylveste went years back. She knew what he was up to, and that he had to be stopped. That was my job. Trouble was, I fucked up.’ ‘You don’t look like the sort to commit cold-blooded murder.’ ‘You don’t know me, Thorn. Not at all.’ ‘Not yet, perhaps.’ He looked at her long and hard until, with some reluctance, she turned away from his gaze. He was a man she felt attracted to and she knew that he was a man who believed in something. He was strong and brave — she had seen that for herself, in Inquisition House. And it was true, even if she did not necessarily want to admit it, that she had engineered this situation with some inkling of how it might play out, from the moment she had insisted that they bring Thorn aboard. But there was no escaping the single painful truth that continued to define her life, even after so much had happened. She was a married woman. Thorn added, ‘But there’s always time, as they say.’ ‘Thorn ‘Keep talking, Ana. Keep talking.’ Thorn’s voice was very soft. ‘I want to hear it all.’ Later, when they had put a light-minute between themselves and the gas giant, the console signalled an incoming tight-beam transmission relayed from Nostalgia for Infinity . Ilia must have tracked Khouri’s ship with deep-look sensors, waiting until there was sufficient angular separation between it and the Inhibitor machines. Even with the relay drones she was deeply anxious not to compromise her position. ‘I see you are on your way home,’ she said, intense displeasure etched into every word. ‘I see also that you went much closer to the heart of their activity than we agreed. That is not good. Not good at all.’ ‘She doesn’t sound happy,’ Thorn whispered. ‘What you did was exceptionally dangerous. I just hope you learned something for your efforts. I demand that you make all haste back to the starship. We mustn’t detain Thorn from his urgent work on Resurgam… nor the Inquisitor from her duties in Cuvier. I will have more to say on this matter when you return.’ She paused before adding, ‘Irina out.’ ‘She still doesn’t know that I know,’ Thorn said. ‘I’d better tell her.’ ‘That doesn’t sound terribly wise to me, Ana.’ She looked at him. ‘No?’ ‘Not just yet. We don’t know how she’d take it. Probably better that we act as if I still think… et cetera.’ He made a spiralling gesture with his forefinger. ‘Don’t you agree?’ ‘I kept something from Ilia once before. It was a serious mistake.’ ‘This time you’ll have me on your side. We can break it to her gently once we’re safe and sound aboard the ship.’ ‘I hope you’re right.’ Thorn narrowed his eyes playfully. ‘It will work out in the end, I promise you that. All you have to do is trust me. That isn’t so hard, is it? After all, it’s no more than you asked of me.’ ‘The trouble was we were lying.’ He touched her arm, a contact that might have seemed accidental had he not prolonged it for several artful seconds. ‘We’ll just have to put that behind us, won’t we?’ She reached over and delicately removed his hand, which closed gently around her own, and for a moment they were frozen like that. Khouri was conscious of her own breathing. She looked at Thorn, knowing full well what she wanted and knowing that he wanted it too. ‘I can’t do this, Thorn.’ ‘Why not?’ He spoke as if there were no valid objection she could possibly raise. ‘Because…’ She slipped her hand from his. ‘Because of what I still am. Because of a promise I made to someone.’ ‘Who?’ Thorn asked. ‘My husband.’ ‘I’m sorry. I never thought for a moment that you might be married.’ He sat back in his seat, putting a sudden distance between them. ‘I don’t mean that in an insulting way. It’s just one minute you’re the Inquisitor, the next you’re an Ultra. Neither exactly fitted my preconceptions of a married woman.’ She raised a hand. ‘It’s all right.’ ‘Who is he, if you don’t mind my asking?’ ‘It isn’t that simple, Thorn. I honestly wish it was.’
