Out here the racket of metal being worked was deafening and everything stank of smoke and tar. She turned left toward the front gate, crossing a bleak yard paved in dolomite in which a warren of buildings had been thrown up as the need required. There were drifts of ash and dust everywhere; the sweepers could not keep up with it. Every surface was covered in a film of oily soot.

'I'm going down to the mine,' she said to Nod, gate attendant for the past thirty years.

The old fellow had a white beard so long that he could tuck the end into his belt, but not a hair on his head. He raised the iron grille. One tall gate stood open. Nod held out his hand. No one was supposed to go out without a chit from their foreman.

'Sorry, Nod,' she said. 'I forgot again.' Gryste always made a fuss so she was reluctant to ask, even though going to the mine was part of her job.

Nod looked over his shoulder then waved her on. 'I didn't see you. Good luck, Tee!' He patted her on the shoulder.

Tiaan found that rather ominous. He'd not wished her luck before. Shrugging on her overcoat, she went out into the wind. The path down to the mine was slushy, the snow on either side brown with soot from furnaces that burned night and day. At the first bend, just before the forest, she looked back.

The clanker manufactory carved an ugly scar across the hillside. From here it comprised a grimy series of scalloped walls ten spans tall, with slits high up and battlements above them. Guard towers hung over the corners, though they were seldom manned, the manufactory being hundreds of leagues from the enemy lines. From the rear a cluster of chimneys belched smoke of various hues – white, orange and greasy black.

Tiaan did not think of the place as ugly. It was just home, and work, the two concepts like joined twins. It had been home since her mother, the pre-eminent breeder in the breeding factory at Tiksi, had sold Tiaan's indenture to the manufactory at the age of six. She had been here ever since. She occasionally went to Tiksi, three or four hours' walk down a steep and stony path, but the rest of the world might not have existed.