'What's the matter with your controllers?'

'I've no idea. I've only just found out that they'd failed. They were perfect when I finished them.'

'How long since you've been paid?' he asked sternly.

'Six weeks.'

'Sit down; eat your lunch!'

'It's your lunch,' she said stubbornly, wanting the food but not the charity.

'It's yours and I expect you to eat it all.'

'But…'

Joeyn patted the bottle. 'This'll do me. I'm going home shortly. I've already met my quota for the day.'

'Quota of what? Illegal drink?' she asked cheekily.

'Do what you're told!' He tilted the bottle up again.

Tiaan consumed the sweet potatoes and began peeling the shell off the egg. She felt better already.

'So why the visit, Tiaan? Not that you aren't welcome any time.'

'Does there have to be a reason?'

'No, but I bet there is. And I'm wondering if it's not about my old stones.' Even if he had just mined the most perfect crystals in the world, Joeyn still referred to them as 'my old stones'.

'It is,' she said. 'The last three you gave me seemed perfect, but failed after a few weeks in their clankers.'

'They were a bit different,' he admitted over another healthy swig. 'But not unusually so.'

'Can I see where you got them from?' she asked, her mouth full of egg. Her belly felt wonderfully full.

'Back this way!' He headed off in the direction she'd come from, lantern swinging.

She followed, nibbling on the sticky rice ball. Tiaan was saving the celery stick till last, to freshen her mouth. Beyond the squeeze, Joeyn went down on hands and knees beneath a bulge of shattered granite held together with tiny white veins, and through into a cavern higher than their heads. In the lamplight Tiaan saw threads of native silver shining in the wall, and across the other side, a vein of massive crystals.

'I love it down here,' Joeyn said, patting the wall. 'The wonders of stone. Ever the same yet always different.'