The woman sighed, settled on the hard stone floor. The rock here was rougher, covered in chip-marks. Someone had cut them away by hand. How long would that take? I couldn't even guess. I shivered. Sitting on stone made the cold worse.

  "Do you listen to music?" the woman, Widen, asked.

  The question took me by surprise. I wasn't much of a music lover. Silence was conductive to warding.

  "I do," slurred Geir from where he lay between me and Hao. His voice startled me, rough and weak at the same time. I'd thought him asleep.

  "We're a performance troupe," Widen said.

  "The Way Stars," a young but surprisingly strong voice piped in. Widen's kid.

  "Never heard of you," Geir said.

  "Widen was the opening act for Triz Traviz for two tours running," Darrow said.

  "And you're her manager," I said, with some bitterness. I'd seen boss-with-benefits solutions before, and the damage they did.

  "I was a roadie," Darrow said. "Wanted to play the twelve-string, but didn't have enough drive to become good. I-"

  "We had a stopover on Tilling," Widen interrupted. "Our ship's engines malfunctioned. She was a tramp hauler, but a good one. Then the Syndicate pirates came."

  "Took the passengers, left the crew," Darrow said. "Left some of the cargo as well."

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  "Captain sold you out," I said, trying to put sympathy into my voice. I'd jumped to a conclusion about him, twice. Taking out my anger over Talain's death on him. It hadn't been fair. The least I could do was commiserate with him.

  "Yes," Widen said. "We ended up on Remba. Two hundred and ten passengers, and now only sixty are alive."

  "That was three years ago," Darrow said.

  "We were the lucky ones," Widen said. "The Syndics dump people in the dunes, tell them they have forty-eight hours, or seventy-six, or some number. Then they will be hunted."

  "We ran," Darrow said. "Were found by a sneak who brought us to the Gash."

  "What's a sneak?" I said.

  "Three types of runners live on Remba," Darrow said. I got the feeling he'd held this lecture a number of times. How often did people come to the desert? Every year? Every month? All the time?

  "We are sneaks," Darrow said. "Hiding in the dunes, scavenging from the death piles. The diggers never go out, living off what they can grow and reclaim. The bloods hunt."

  "What do they hunt?" Hao interrupted. She had a can of her own that she was drinking from. Something in syrup or sauce, then. Her face was all shadows in the dim light.

  "Horses," Darrow said. "Goats. Buffalo. Spider-lizards occasionally."

  "Men," Widen said. "They're as bad as the Syndics."

  "Not all of them," Darrow said.

  "Do you really have a ship?" their kid piped in.

  "Yes," I said. "A light hauler."

  The circle fell silent, everyone still. Even the kid didn't move. I suddenly realized this was what they'd all been waiting for, preparing for, for years. How long did it take you to stop believing you could get away? Widen hadn't believed me. Her kid seemed to. They'd all heard me talking to Widen when I'd traded for the medkit. A ship. A way off Remba.

  They didn't dare to ask. I could understand that. As long as you didn't ask, you couldn't get a no. But I could get them out. Them and the Kylians. Get everyone away from Syndicate space.

  "How many of you are there?" I said.

  "About four hundred people in the Gash," Widen said. "Another three hiddens that I've visited. Others that I've heard about."

  My heart stuck in my throat. Thousands of people, all needing to get off the planet. It was impossible.