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soon fell into ruin.’

    ‘We call it the Aad,’ said Chu. ‘It’s an old word that means “disease” or “bad luck”. No one goes there. It’s inhabited by creatures from the Divide now.’

    Skender nodded. That matched the Book of Towers, too. ‘What the book doesn’t say about Laure is that it rests on a cave system — I could see the openings from further up the Divide.’ The geography of Laure was complex, belying the simplicity of the tale. Laure cowered in a triangular dogleg of the Divide like a mouse backed into a corner. The ground it rested on had subsided in the distant past, most probably during the Cataclysm, so that the remains of the original settlement now clung to its sloping fringes. A new city had been built in the gutted centre of the hollow, the matching piece of which rested on the far side of the Divide — the Ruin Chu had called the Aad. A steep, forbidding wall cut a stark line around the side of Laure not protected by the steep slopes of the dogleg. Massive symbols painted on the outside of the Wall added to the protection granted by the sheer mass of stone. No one knew who had built it, but without it the city would be completely exposed to the Divide.

    To the left and right of the Wall, dotting the sheer cliff faces, gaping holes led deep underground.

    ‘I think my mother was heading for them, or was forced to hide in them by something unexpected.’

    ‘They’re not just caves,’ said Chu. ‘There are artificial tunnels, too. I’ve never seen them myself, but I’ve heard stories. They’re bigger than anything we could’ve made, and were full of old metal a long time ago.’

    A shiver of dread mixed with excitement rushed through him. ‘I don’t understand how you could be a miner and not have seen them. Isn’t using the old tunnels and caves the obvious thing to do if you’re digging underground?’

    ‘Right.’ Again she smiled knowingly.

    ‘There’s something you’re not telling me,’ he said to her, pushing his empty cup aside and leaning over the table. ‘You know where my mother is, don’t you?’

    Brushing an errant strand of perfectly black hair from her eyes, she also leaned forward until they were less than a hand’s span apart. ‘I think it’s time we came to an arrangement, Skender Van Haasteren,’ she said in a conspiratorial whisper. ‘You say you don’t have much money, but that’s not a problem. We can still do business. Agree, and I’ll tell you why me being a miner doesn’t have anything to do with old tunnels and caves. I’ll also tell you why you’re probably looking in the wrong place for your mother. Okay?’

    Skender was automatically suspicious. He thought of all the material things he had brought with him: the buggy; a small amount of money; an ornate metal clasp his mother had salvaged from a burial site excavated three years earlier, which he was too afraid to wear in the city in case it was stolen. There was nothing he would willingly part with.

    On the other hand, he needed to know where his mother might be, and he found that he enjoyed the company of this strange young woman. He could live with the risk of being screwed over in order to keep her around a little longer.

    He scratched his arm where his Blood Tithe had been taken on entry into the city. The small wound itched.

    ‘What do you want?’ he asked her.

    ‘Something you take completely for granted,’ she said. ‘And if you do it right, it won’t cost you a thing.’

    ‘What?

    ‘Freedom, Skender Van Haasteren.’ Her dark brown eyes were bottomless. ‘You’re my ticket, and I’m not letting go of you until you’ve delivered.’

    * * * *

    The Homunculus

     
    ‘Through the Change, we can connect far-flung
    places. We reach out with our thoughts and our
    senses; we send our bodies along Ways from one
    end of the Interior to the other. But where are
    those thoughts, minds and bodies when they are
    in transit, if not in the actual world? They