We snaked our way across the sands, a thin line of people, each stepping in the other's footsteps. Or rather, next to their footsteps, their weight shoving sand into the tracks, partially obscuring them. Their long camouflage cloaks swept away even more traces of our passing. The three last bloods in the Knife's line walked slightly bent over, dragging a thin, uneven steel brush behind them, erasing every remnant of our passing.

  Their skill amazed me. I'd known security forces who'd pay kilotons of helion to have people like that on their teaching staff.

  And here they were, slowly starving away on Remba.

  We made good time, only me, Hao, and three of Geir's friends not quite managing to cover our tracks. The bloods did it for us.

  Two nights we walked, spending our days sleeping and shivering. We reached the port's outer defenses, the line of sensor domes, minefields and electro-barbs, in the early pre-dawn, the horizon turning from black to a deep magenta. We'd made good time. I should have been relieved.

  Except that something was wrong.

  Last time, the port had been a single, steady light in the distance. Now it was flashing, tiny lights roving the skies above it.

  One of the Knife's men cleared his throat and coughed up some dusty phlegm.

  "Not good," he said, coughed again. An old-man sound. All of the Knife's friends were old, or looked old.

  "No," the Knife agreed.

  "What's going on?" I said.

  We were lying in a shallow dell, the sand cold through my coat. When I got away from Remba, I'd get one with lined polymer nano-tubes to keep the heat. And an electric heating net. And more wards.

  "The Syndicates are marshaling," the Knife said. "Those are low-level quadcopters. Likely, they're making sure no one uses the opportunity to scout enemy territory.

  "Or they're hunting someone," one of the three Kylians who'd come with us said. I realized I hadn't asked her name, lumping her together with the Knife's friends, just another blood. Maybe she was. The Kylians had shown themselves apt at hiding among the sand dunes.

  "Who?" I said.

  She dismissed the question with a minute tilt of the corner of her camouflage coat. "Last time I saw something like this," she said, "was after the raid on the com center."

  "You were in on that?" I said. Some of my surprise must have leaked through, because she grimaced in the shadows beneath her hood.

  "Rear guard," she said. "Never got into the center. No one who did survived. A fool's fight."

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  "Not so foolish," I said. "It brought us here."

  That got me a snort from more than the woman.

  "Three men," she said. "And an impounded ship. Forgive me if I don't dance in the sand with joy."

  I was about to reply when the Knife stopped me.

  "Quit the jabbering," he said with a rock-hard harshness in his voice. "We don't have the time for this. We need a plan."

  "We have a plan," I said. "We move in and start a war."

  Coughing Man coughed again. It took me a second to realize he was laughing.

  "You want to get kilt," he said, "that's your life. But leave your fancy rifle behind."

  "You want to run scared," I said, "that's your choice. I'm going forward."

  More coughing laughter, and snickers from the rest of the twenty-odd crew. Wrong answer. Should have kept my mouth shut.

  "You think to get us kilt with a heroic speech, mister hero?" Coughing Man said.

  I heard the tremor in his voice. Coughing Man was scared. They were all scared. And Coughing Man wasn't old. His gauntness and the weather-beaten skin had fooled me. He was my age, maybe even younger.

  These people had raided the death piles, hunted the horses and animals on Remba with knives and ropes. They weren't cowards.

  Neither did they have a death wish.

  "If we back away now," I said, "we might get back to the Gash. Maybe. But there are people behind us, a great, big wave of people. They'll get gunned down. No question about it.

  "Some of you might think that this will leave more food for you. But those are all the diggers, all the sneaks back there. You think you'll survive when there's no one left to tend the hiddens? No one to repair the water pumps?"

  "Kid's right," the Knife said, not using my however-fake-name. "We can't go back. And it's a good time. If they're moving through Red Raven turf, they'd have shut down the shockers. We follow old tracks, we can crawl through."

  "If they're moving," another of the Knife's bloods said. "And we don't get run over. I agree with Sael. Pointless to go and get killed."

  "Use your eyes," the Knife said. "Those lights aren't fireworks. They're moving."

  They started arguing in quiet voices. It was like watching a brawl in slow-motion. Nobody moved. Nobody shouted. Nobody so much as tilted their heads. To anyone observing, we were just slight lumps in the sand, an uneven edge to the dell. Even sound sensors wouldn't pick up much.

  And yet, the tide was turning against the Knife. His bloods weren't rebelling, but all the suggestions were about withdrawing, regrouping, ambushing single Syndics. Apart from the Knife, and two of the three Kylians, no one was arguing for moving forward.

  I unbuttoned my coat, unzipped one of the armor pockets, withdrew a pale grey, hexagonal ceramic plate the size of my palm.

  "Would this help?" I said, holding it up.

  My arm stuck out like a scraggly tree stump in the air, clearly visible above the rim of the dell. Someone was bound to tell me to bring it down before the Syndics noticed. I forced myself to keep it aloft, expecting a bullet any time.

  "What's that?" Coughing Man said.

  I conjured up a thread of force, caressed my wards with it. A pale blue, electric light flowed over the side of the plate, briefly illuminating the sand, the shapes, the upraised, pale faces.

  "Bullet wards," I said. "Engraved them myself. They'll deviate projectiles. Stop a few, too. And if all else fails, this is two-hundred-fold ablative. It will stop a twelve-millimeter round. I've got enough to give all of us some protection."

  I let that sink in, still holding my arm in the air. The wind made the tassels on my camouflage cloak flutter.

  "We have to move forward," I said. "We won't get another chance like this."

  Silence. Nobody moved. Maybe I'd miscalculated again.

  "Well, crud-ee," Coughing Man said after a moment. "Give me one of them plates and lets crawl."

  I tossed him the plate. He caught it in the air.

  "Don't put it in your hat band," I said. "A twelve mil will still rip your head off."

  "For Sael, that'd be improvement," the Knife said, to soft laughter from everyone.