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I realized how unlikely that was. Calandra was only about thirty-eight—five years older than me—which meant she’d have been barely sixteen when darMaupine’s grab for temporal power was finally overthrown. “We’re both Watchers,” I reminded her. “Committed to God and to each other. That makes our lives each other’s business.”
    She snorted gently. “Sorry, but I gave up commitments like that a long time ago.”
    I felt a vague stirring of anger. I was trying as hard as I could to forget her crime and accept her as an equal, and all she was doing was rubbing salt on my patience. “Maybe the rest of us haven’t given up on you,” I gritted. “Just because you ran out on your people when they needed you—”
    â€œOh, you think I ran out because of what Aaron Balaam darMaupine did to us with his insane vision?”
    â€œYou wouldn’t have been the first,” I told her, fighting doggedly to give her the benefit of the doubt. “With all the animosity that mess generated—”
    â€œAnimosity?” she cut me off. “Is that what you got on Outbound? Animosity?”
    I pursed my lips. Others fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them … “I’m sure it was a lot worse on Bridgeway. Especially for a teenager.”
    She glared at me. “I doubt you could even imagine it. Certainly not from such a lofty and protected place as the Carillon Group. Oh, don’t look so surprised—I know whose ship I’m on. I haven’t been living in a hole all these years. Or in a Watcher colony.” She cocked her head slightly to the side. “And before you start talking about deserting the faith, you might remember that you aren’t exactly living at your settlement, either. Haven’t for quite a few years, as a matter of fact.”
    Anger stirred within me … anger, and a painful feeling of helplessness. Of course she would have picked that up: my speech patterns, my body language, a thousand other cues—they all pointed to my long absence from a Watcher settlement as clearly as a spaceport skysign.
    And in those eleven years I’d been away from home, I was suddenly learning, I’d forgotten what it was like to be with another Watcher. How profoundly naked it felt to stand beneath that all-seeing gaze.
    I nearly turned around and walked out right then and there. But I didn’t. Blessed are the merciful: they shall have mercy shown them … Perhaps it was a desire to prove that I knew the actions as well as the words. “I’d like to ask you a few questions about your crime,” I managed.
    â€œWhy?” she retorted. “Have the elders added some form of ritual last rites to the repertoire?”
    I ignored the jibe, all I could think of to do. “I just want to talk. To hear your side of … what happened.”
    She studied me, and I felt my discomfort grow stronger. “No Watchers died. Not from your Cana settlement, or from anywhere else. Is that what you wanted to know?”
    â€œPartly,” I admitted, my sense of nakedness growing stronger. Here I was, trying my best to mask my emotions from her; and not only was she reading them like a book, she was just as casually picking up my thoughts, too. It made me feel like a child again. “I also wanted to know why you did it.”
    She looked me straight in the eye. “I didn’t.”
    For three heartbeats I thought I’d heard her wrong. I—you—?”
    â€œYou heard me right. I didn’t do it.”
    For a long minute I looked at her. “I don’t …” I began; but the words faded into silence. She was hiding a great deal of herself from me—that much was clear. But she couldn’t hide everything … and the sense of her was definitely that she was telling the truth.
    â€œDon’t believe me?” she finished my sentence. “I