"I need to speak to Master Saradon," I said, drawing myself up and presenting the best image of a navy drill sergeant I could.

  The guards outside our door, two of the brown-clad truncheon-and-needler squad, weren't impressed.

  "Master Saradon is in seclusion," they said, almost in unison. As if they'd been instructed to say it, or it was so obvious that only a child or a Galactic might question it.

  "Mistress," I said to Riina, and she stepped up, rubbing her eyes. I had expected her to pace as I warded, but she'd kept reading, studying the brief and the original texts, checking our plan, looking for flaws or alternatives. If she had a lazy bone in her body, she'd hammered it into submission by pure grit.

  She came to stand beside me, stretching and sticking her chin out. I expected the guards to deflate and go running for Saradon.

  Apparently not. They kept blocking our path, two well-muscled grunts in thin, brown shirts and hose that made no secret of exactly how well-muscled they were. They made a great commercial for the Dromoni school of gladiatorial weight-lifting.

  "Well," Riina said after a moment.

  "Beg your pardon, Mistress," the rightmost guard said. He was a bit older, maybe middle-aged, his hair greying at the sides. "Master Saradon is in seclusion."

  "What about Traz?" I said. "Master Saradon's protégé."

  "Master Saradon," the guard said, with enough of a roll of his eyes to tell me what he thought of me, "is in seclusion."

  "Will you carry a message?" Riina said.

  The guard started to speak, then fell silent.

  "The master is in seclusion," he said, as if that explained everything.

  "When will he be out of seclusion?" I said. I might as well have ceased to exist for all the impression that did. We kept staring at each other, me and Riina glaring at the guards, they giving us the empty-eyed, distant not-quite-stare of uncooperative servants everywhere.

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  In the end, we gave up. We didn't have time for meaningless fights. It wasn't the guards' fault that we were ignorant Galactics. I still wanted to punch them, though.

  I settled for crashing down into the couch.

  "We need to see Saradon," I said. "Or Traz. Physically. If they don't get the bullet, we lose."

  "Nothing on the com," Riina said. "We've been cut off from the net."

  "Maybe we're in seclusion, too," I said.

  "Likely," Riina replied. "Nothing in the dueling rules about it, but maybe it's a customs thing. How do we get out?"

  "We?" I said.

  That got me a glare full of the anger Riina hadn't vented on the guards. Strangely, it felt good to know that she had feelings, and was just as frustrated as I. Misery and company and all that.

  "We," Riina said. "I don't expect you to go running off alone."

  "Why not?" I said. "I'm fairly good at it."

  "Jakob," Riina said. "Do you even have a map?"

  "No," I said. "But I have an engraving drill, plenty of flat surfaces, and the ability to silence my steps and bend light."

  That stopped her, turning her to a brown pillar locked between anger and amazement.

  "You can do that?" she said.

  I didn't reply, not wanting to lie. You can do an inverted flash ward, but it's mighty suspicious when a patch of shadow keeps moving without anything casting it. And it eats all forms of electromagnetic radiation, leaving a path of shut-down com stations, blind cameras, and annoyed guards.

  "You could give me the map," I said. "One of us needs to remain behind and worry for the benefit of our illustrious watchmen." I nodded at the closed door to our quarters.

  "You're enjoying this," Riina said.

  "Of course," I replied. "It's not every day that a lowly Galactic protégé gets to boss a mighty Mistress invited to the house Trevalon."

  "I'll get you for it," Riina said, but there was a twinkle in her eye and her sing-song voice danced around the words. "Go ward. I'll get us food. Growing boy like you should eat before you catch your death."

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  She paused, waiting for a reply, but I had no idea what to say.

  "Didn't you have a grandmother?" she said.

  "Actually, no," I said. Which was the truth and hadn't bothered me before.

  "I'll find you one when we get back to the Belithain," Riina said. "As long as you don't catch your death in the meantime."

  "I'll go ward," I said. "And order some tea."

  "Yes, Master Jacob," Riina replied with mock seriousness.

  I laughed. It would probably have given the Dromoni a collective heart attack.