And of course, the humans were here. They weren’t sprawling out in the open for a change, but the lamps made by the Ancients would betray any living body no matter how well it hid from him. The humans breathed in soft, shallow breaths, believing themselves undetectable, yet their grubby little handprints were on the mirrors, on the fountain, even on the dead machine. The smell of smoke and an unwashed body was strong, very strong, but there was no sex-smell yet.

“I know you are here,” he said. “Put yourselves in order and get out.”

No response.

His patience slipped. He made no effort to regrip it.

“It would seem the room is empty,” he hissed. “I think I’ll just lock the door so that no other human wanders in.”

“Leave me alone.”

That was Amber’s voice. Meoraq took a step back, inexplicably embarrassed, and then lunged forward in an equally inexplicable fury. “Who the hell is with you?” he demanded, managing not to shout only by the aid of Sheul and half a night’s meditation.

“Nobody. Go away.”

Nobody? Meoraq took another look at the handprints marking up the mirrored walls and saw they were all the same size. But the moaning, the ragged breaths…?

“I told you to stay together,” he said at last, because he had to say something.

“You said to stay away from the windows. See any windows in here, lizardman? Go away!”

He did not see windows, only the smudgy image of himself in the ancient mirrors. His reflection—distorted by time in spite of, or because of, the ages of meticulous cleaning it had received—glowered back at him. It rendered his face unrecognizable as his own; the body, hulking and malformed.

Without warning, it occurred to him to wonder if the humans thought him ugly. If his face seemed lumpish and horrible compared to their smooth, flat ones. If he was, in fact, monstrous.

He looked at the closed doors of the many stalls. Behind one of them, Amber hid from him.

‘I hung her up like a cut of meat in a butcher’s window,’ he thought suddenly. And he’d done it in front of all her people. He’d done it with a smile. Meoraq scratched at the side of his snout, which did not itch. “What are you doing in there?”

“Nothing.”

And before he knew it, out came his father’s: “You can do that anywhere. Come out where I can see you.”

“No.”

He showed his teeth to the stalls and then rubbed hard at his brow-ridges. He had no experience with this sort of thing and, he suspected, no talent. “Is something wrong?”

She laughed, which was encouraging right up until she also said, “Why no! What the hell could possibly be wrong? Go away! I don’t want to talk! I put your stupid tent up, so go lie in it.”

Meoraq went to the first of the stalls and opened it. Apart from whatever incomprehensible device of the Ancients occupied it, it stood empty.

“I’m warning you!”

“Are you indeed?” he snorted, opening the next stall. Also empty. “It should be interesting to see how that plays out.” The next stall opened, and the one after that, but the fifth did not give to the pressure of his hand. “Because I rather suspect it will not go in your favor.” He tapped two fingers meaningfully on the lock-plate. “You have until the count of six,” he told her, “and then I knock this door in.”

“Just go away!” Her voice cracked on the last word. She was quiet a short time, and then calmly said, “I’ll be out in a few minutes.”

“One,” countered Meoraq.

“Just give me a few minutes, for God’s sake!”

“Two.”

“Goddamn alien prick!”

“Three, four, five—”

The door came open with a wheeze, its design preventing the violent bang she intended. Her first efforts to shove past him proved futile and somewhat laughable, so there she stood, furiously trying to meet his eyes while her own were wet. “What do you want?”

“Tell me what you are doing here.”

She snorted right to his face. “You couldn’t possibly understand, so no. You wanted me to go back to bed? Fine. Get out of my way and let me do it.”

“You have until the count of six—” he began.

“Oh for—I ripped my shirt! There, are you happy?”

He knew he’d heard her and yet that made no sense at all. She’d slunk off to cry over a tear in her clothes? He didn’t believe it. Maybe if it were Nicci, but not Amber.

He tipped his head to a cautious angle of inquiry. “I did not mark you.”

“I ripped my shirt,” she said again, her angry voice cracking a second time. “Now I’ve got this huge hole that I can’t fix.”

“You have no other shirts?”

“They all reek,” she said, refusing to look at him. “And they’re all full of holes too. I only have one new shirt left, but it’s the last one and if…” She pressed her shaking lips together and did not speak for a long time. “It got to me, okay? You can think it’s stupid all you want. I agree. You’re right. It’s stupid. Now leave me alone.”

Meoraq hunted for something to say while Amber stared at the wall beside his shoulder and kept her too-bright eyes dry. “You knew I have a mending kit,” he said finally. “You might ask to borrow it.”

Her mouth pressed tighter together. She did not reply.

Her clothing was worn thin. He’d marked it before this night. Long before. And the weather was only coming in colder. He couldn’t see the tear she spoke of, but by the stiff way she stood, hugging her arms to her chest, he could guess where it was. And he’d probably done it himself, binding her to her own spear. He tried to think back, but couldn’t truthfully say one way or another. It was likely, though.

He really was an insensitive brunt. Her clothes were falling off her. They hadn’t been designed for hard travel in the first place, much less this endless wear. He could order his replaced at the next city he passed by, but hers…hers were all she had.

Meoraq exhaled an uncomfortable hiss and made a half-gesture behind him at the door. “I have a spare tunic.”

Her eyes snapped to him and away, blazing. “I don’t want it.”

“Eh?”

“I said, no! Stop giving me things! Just stop! What do you think people are going to say when they see me wearing your shirt tomorrow?”

“What do you want from me then?” he exploded.

“I wanted you to leave me alone!”

“Well, you don’t get what you want!” he shouted, very dimly aware that what had begun as a poor imitation of a calm conversation had shattered beyond repair into splendidly irrational bickering. “I get what I want and I want you to shut up and wear my fucking tunic!”

She burst into tears.

“And if I tell you to wear the harness and the breeches that go with it,” Meoraq raged on, “that is what you’ll do! I’ll dress every Gann-damned sliver of you if it pleases me to do so and I will not hear another word about it!”

“You can’t make me, you scaly son of a bitch!”

“Ha!” And yes, he was entirely senseless now. “I don’t even know what that means so I can’t be offended by it!”

“It means your mother was a bitch!” she screamed at him.

“She could have been!” he roared back. “But my father was Uyane Rasozul in the sight of Sheul, twenty-six years a Sheulek, steward of his bloodline, lord over his House, and champion to all Xeqor, and it is his son who stands before you now! You see Meoraq, ha, here before God and Gann! Tell me again what I can and cannot make you do and just see what happens!”

He had to stop there for a breath, and it was there that Scott’s voice rang out with brilliant clarity: “Do you mind? Some of us are trying to sleep!”

Meoraq and Amber both stared at the door. He honestly wasn’t sure which of them moved first after that, but in another moment they were both storming back into the sleeping room, side at side, like an army of two.

Meoraq went straight to Scott, who sat up fast and scooted foolishly backwards while still wrapped in his bedding until he hit another human and had to stop.