It had taken Mariah quite a while to pick out the dress she was wearing. She had dug through the clothes she'd brought with her from Sihnon twice, Mona sitting on the bed and critiquing, until she found it at the bottom of a suitcase. It was a classical sari, a translucent swath of pink and gold wrapped around deep red silk. She hadn't worn it since her twenty-first birthday, the night her father had…well, in a long while. Mona had immediately approved of the dress, but it wasn't until Mariah had seen Dex's reaction as she walked into the dining room that she knew her time had been well spent. Now, she had her hand around Dex's arm as the guard waved them through the entrance to the upper deck. He was dressed in his finest as well, although the mechanic's finest consisted of a slightly wrinkled dress shirt and a vest that looked as if it had been cut from a throw rug. He'd obviously been a little embarrassed when he saw how much more elegantly she was dressed, but she couldn't understand why. She thought he looked cute. Dex nodded to the guard and they stepped off the bare steel floor onto the poshly carpeted parlor of Hobenson's private penthouse level. There were gaming tables set up throughout, about two dozen people milling about, or starting early games of mah jong, or congregating at the full bar that stood opposite the deck's massive star-filled windows. Smiling and offering casual greetings to the clusters of people they passed, Mariah and Dex, arms still clasped, moved toward the tables. That was their job, along with the doctor, to get into the games and do their best to make the job worthwhile. Mariah was good enough at cards herself, though she felt uneasy about trying to join the games on Artemis—neither Saul nor the captain seemed very enthusiastic about her attempts to integrate herself with the crew. Mona told her it would just take time, but it always seemed as if Captain Wu didn't trust her, thought she had an ulterior motive. As Dex nodded sheepishly to her and broke off toward one of the games already in progress, Mariah looked back to the door, where Daphne and the doctor were entering. Leopold was wearing a dark suit—as had his uncle when he and Mona entered in front of them—much like those he had worn for his entire stay on Artemis, with a few slight variations that would only be apparent to someone of Core breeding. To the untrained eye, it probably seemed as if Sir Anderson and his nephew had been wearing the same clothes for two weeks. Daphne had her arm looped in the doctor's, and was pressed against him a little closer than seemed necessary. The scrap of blue silk that meandered tightly about the Companion's chest and hips was just enough to keep her from being bound for indecent exposure—apparently she hadn't exactly taken the captain's advice on taste to heart. Leopold caught Mariah's eye across the room and he and Daphne began to head toward her. When he reached her, the doctor planted a light kiss on the back of Mariah's hand. "You look absolutely gorgeous, Miss Boleyn." Daphne uncoupled from the doctor and reached out to draw her fingers down the front of the silk, grinning sensuously as she gazed Mariah up and down. "Yeah, e gou bao." Mariah blushed. Daphne always made her uncomfortable when she acted like this. The Companion sighed a little and pulled her hand away. "I'll be seeing you two." Mariah let out a breath in relief as Daphne swayed off toward the bar. The Companion would be at Hobenson's table with the captain and Sir Anderson. However intimidated Mariah might have been by Captain Wu, she couldn't argue with her judgment; all the highest of the high rollers would be at that table, so it made sense to have the two people onboard with the most social clout standing by as political insurance. The captain and Saul were at the bar, chatting leisurely with an aging man in a straight white suit. The cook had on a tuxedo (or a reasonable approximation) and Captain Wu was fidgeting in a teal cocktail dress on loan from Mariah. Casting one last, uneasy glance around the deck, Mariah nodded absentmindedly to Leopold and broke off to find a game. She didn't like this place. It was too much like home. The man in the white suit—who had introduced himself as Magistrate Higgins, owner of the eponymous mud-farming moon, some distance farther outsystem—nodded politely and left the bar to greet a portly older woman he apparently knew. Rachel sighed, brushing a stray hair back into her complex coif and rotating her shoulders to find a comfortable position in the dress. "Can't stand wearin' this. Why can't th' rich just dress like normal folk?" Saul pulled awkwardly at the collar of the suffocating white shirt. "You're tellin' me." Rachel cast him a skeptical glance. "Thought you were upper crust back home. Shouldn' you be used t' this sort of thing?" Saul shrugged. "Sorry to disappoint, sir. I tried to spend most my time in a chef's apron. Never did get th' hang of all this." Rachel smiled a bit and nodded. The cook didn't talk much about his life on Persephone, before the War. She knew he'd been pretty well-off, and had relatives on the Core, but that was about it. She didn't prod; she knew as well as anyone that there were some parts of a person's past that it's only respectful to keep buried. "You clear on your job?" Saul nodded, eyes scanning the hall casually. "Wait'll the games start. Snoop around. Find out where he's keepin' the girl, just in case we gotta do this plan B." Rachel nodded. "And I want you to take Mona." "Cap'n, I don't think…" "I need someone to keep an eye on her. Got an interest in stayin' subtle here, and that ain't Mona's strong point. 'Sides, she might be handy, you come across a lock or somesuch." Saul frowned and nodded, then tapped the captain's shoulder. "Qing cai, ta bi jin." Rachel looked up, and saw a man in a finely tailored blue suit gliding across the suddenly silent floor, entourage flitting around him like flies. She nodded to Saul, and the two broke off from the bar. "'Scuse me, Mister Hobenson." Hobenson turned toward her and smiled. Rachel knew that smile; it was the same one that Badger had, the smile that said the wearer would be your best friend—until you crossed him. Then he'd have you cut into chunks, have the chunks tossed out an airlock, and calmly move down to the next name on the list to replace you. The feng dui sha ren fan smile. Rachel gulped as he extended his hand. This had been a bad idea.