On arrival in the city the Naxids had grabbed over four hundred hostages from the streets, and announced they would be killed if any more acts of resistance were mounted.

 “People are still angry over the hostages,” Macnamara said. “But they’re starting to be scared too.”

 “There are thirteen Torminel unaccounted for,” Sula said. “At least three action teams, plus their group commander.”

 Macnamara absorbed this news thoughtfully. “How do we find them?”

 Sula could only shrug. “Hang around in Torminel neighborhoods till we hear something?”

 It had been a facetious suggestion, but Macnamara took it seriously. “A good way to get arrested. Torminel cops are going to wonder what we’re doing there.”

 Especially as the Torminel were a nocturnal species. Terrans would very much stand out in their neighborhoods, both at night when the Torminel were active or in the day when they weren’t.

 Sula gave it some thought. “Maybe it’s better if wedon’t contact them,” she said. “They’ve got all the supplies they need to conduct a war right where they are. So do we. If we’re not in touch, we can’t give each other away.”

 Macnamara nodded. “So we’re going to keep on fighting then,” he said.

 The option to quit had always been there. To stay where they were and do nothing, to wait for the war to end one way or another. No one would blame them, not once their superiors had died.

 “Oh yes.” Sula could feel the tension twitching in her jaw muscles. “We’re still at war. And I know just where we’re going to start.”

 “Yes?”

 “With Lord Makish of the High Court,” Sula said. “The Naxid judge who sentenced our friends to death.”

 An expression of satisfaction settled onto Macnamara’s face. “Very well, my lady,” he said.

 High Judge Makish lived in the Makish Palace in the High City, and for anyone who wasn’t a mountaineer, there were only two ways onto Zanshaa’s granite acropolis: a funicular railway for pedestrians, and a switchback road for vehicles. Since the seat of the entire government was in the High City, in the midst of a hostile population, Sula supposed the Naxids would be very careful about who got onto the acropolis and who didn’t.