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A vague unease crept up Nellie’s spine, and she slitted her eyes at Phillip. What was with him today? He knew better than to talk about the Goddess like that. It could get you a session with the Black Box. “And He searches until He finds Ivana,” she said hastily, cutting him off. “When He hears Her story, He brings Her back to the Sarrendar temple and has Her reinstated as high priestess. Then They start searching for Their sons together.”

“But They can’t find them,” said Phillip, ignoring her disapproving glance. “No one can track the pedlar, and the priests lie about the other twin so they don’t have to give him back. They train him as a warrior priest, and when the Outbacks rebel against a new temple tax, he leads the troops against the rebels. Except, unknown to him, his twin is fighting with the rebels.”

“The Jinnet,” Lierin muttered with a hiss.

Giving a sharp sniff of agreement, Nellie continued. “And the twin sons fight the Great War for three years, never even knowing about each other until a great bird of light appears to each of them separately and whispers the truth into their ears.”

“Do you believe that bird of light stuff?” Phillip demanded, shutting his book with a snap. “I mean, how many times have you seen a twinkling birdie appear out of the sky? But of course the twins waste the next ten years in a great odyssey, searching for each other all across Windros, even traveling to Hell and Heaven, and fighting demons and angels and monsters on land and sea. And in the end, they’re both killed before they find each other.”

“What is wrong with you today?” Lierin asked, giving him a quick shove. “Of course, I believe the Goddess’s story. Everyone knows the twin sons were sent by the Gods to show us the way to the stars. If we’re obedient and faithful, we’ll ride the light like They do when we die.”

“D’you know that for sure?” asked Phillip.

“Of course, I do,” Lierin snapped, her voice rising. “The Goddess said it.”

“Oh yeah?” said Phillip. “And did She send a twinkling birdie out of the sky to tell you?”

“I read the star charts every day,” Lierin shot back heatedly. “I know which stars to pray to so I can keep my heart pure. My faith is strong, so I know what’s true.”

“And you?” Phillip glanced at Nellie, his eyes careful and heavy lidded. “Do you believe this stuff?”

“Of course,” faltered Nellie. “It’s the way to eternal life among the stars. Don’t you?”

“I dunno,” shrugged Phillip. “All I’m saying is you can’t know for
sure
it’s true. Even the books disagree on exactly what happened, so how are you supposed to
know?
” He fidgeted again, shivering with an odd restlessness. “I’m not saying I believe it, and I’m not saying I don’t. But even if it is true, what do the twins have to do with us? They’re just two guys who lived a long time ago, and their story isn’t even all that interesting. So what if the Gods rewarded their great odyssey by giving them eternal life? They only got to become moons, not even stars, and for most of the year they’re nowhere near each other in the sky. It’s only during the month of Lulunar that they travel next to each other. Some reward that is. As far as I can see, the Gods screwed the twins when they were alive, then screwed them again eternally by forcing them to reunite as the Twin Moons and remember the whole mess for an entire month every year.”

Nellie and Lierin stared at him, openmouthed. Uneasily, Phillip’s eyes flitted between them, then dropped. “Hey, don’t get uptight,” he muttered. “All I’m saying is, if it had been me, I would just want to be dead. Bye-bye twinnie, I don’t want to become a moon. Sorry I didn’t get to be best buds while we were alive but I’m dead now, so who cares?”

“That’s blasphemy,” Lierin said flatly. “You can’t talk about the Goddess’s sons like that.”

“I’m not talking about
them
,” said Phillip quickly. “I’m saying if it was
me
.”

“Well, it isn’t you,” snapped Lierin. “Since when have you been half-god?”

Phillip shrugged, picked up the book in his lap and set it down again.

Nellie finally found her voice. “You’re just lucky,” she whispered, “that it’s only us listening to you. What if—?” Shakily she pointed to the monitoring screen at the end of the room.

Again Phillip shrugged. “No one was listening,” he said. “I checked first. Anyway, you don’t think Detta takes this Goddess crap seriously, do you? It’s just a story. You don’t have to believe in Her to be a functional cadet.”

“Phillip Grennin Bolderveen?” said a voice, and a man in Detta uniform stepped around the end of the barricade that ran the middle of the room. Phillip gave a sudden wheeze, as if punched in the gut.

“Yes, sir?” he whispered.

“Come with me,” said the man, his gaze tightening on Phillip’s face. “Bring your books.”

Nellie watched Phillip pale, then slide slowly from the bed and approach the end of the barricade. Without a word the man stepped aside, letting him pass, then glanced at the two girls.

“You failed to report this,” he said, his voice clipped and neutral.

“I was going to,” Lierin said immediately. “After we finished—”

“Next time, walk immediately to the monitoring screen and press the alarm button,” continued the man, ignoring her interruption. “Now, full attention. This is Code SM9T. Bring up cabinet forty-seven. Have you got it?”

The girls nodded silently as a filing cabinet with the number forty-seven stamped above the top drawer appeared inside their heads.

“File this incident in drawer three, file nine,” said the man. “When you have done this, you will not remember my presence, nor will you
remember Phillip Grennin Bolderveen being here this afternoon. You are working on your assignment alone, just the two of you. Now close drawer number three, lock it and put cabinet forty-seven away. Is it done?”

Eyes glazed, both girls nodded again.

“It is done,” the man in the Detta uniform said crisply. Stepping around the barricade, he left the room. On the bed Nellie and Lierin sat, staring blankly as filing cabinet forty-seven faded from their minds. A long slow breath coursed through each of them.

“Uh,” said Nellie, rubbing the back of her hand across her mouth. Where was she? Oh yeah, her bedroom. And what was she doing? Um, there was a book in her lap and Lierin was sitting beside her with a laptop. Okay, she had it — they were working on a Star Class assignment that had to do with the death of the Goddess’s sons and the build-up to the Great War. Yeah, it was all coming back now. They were at the part where a group of Outback rebels killed the warrior-priest twin in the Battle of the Northern Stars. Then, several days later, another rebel group mistook the pedlar twin for his brother and killed him in the Ambush of the Morning Light. For the death of both the Goddess’s sons, the ten cities of the Interior never forgave the Outbacks. Banding together in outrage, they officially renamed themselves the “Interior” and sealed themselves off from all outsiders. From this point on they developed fast and furious, outstripping the Outbacks in commerce, technology and culture. But for all that, they were never able to subdue the Outbacks. One hundred and fifty years later, the Great War was ongoing and Outbackers continued to live in waywardness, blasphemy and squalor.

“Some day,” said Lierin fiercely, staring at her laptop screen, “when I get my full-class agent status, I’m going to
ask
to be sent to the Outbacks. And when I get there, I’m going to nail every one of those pagans.”

Taking a quick breath, Nellie nodded. “Yeah,” she said. “In honor of the Goddess.”

They were silent a moment, and then Lierin sighed. “C’mon,” she said. “Let’s get this finished so we can go to the gym.”

“Yeah,” echoed Nellie, “the gym.” She flipped to the next page in her book, then paused. Something seemed to be shifting inside her brain, as if trying to get out. Get out of what? Annoyed, she gave her head a shake. If this kept up, she was going to have to pay another visit to the Mind Cleanser. “Okay,” she said. “Next, the Goddess ... “

They continued with the assignment.

“WHERE’S MY 99 Badge?”
Crowded into the space between her dresser and free-standing closet, Tana glared at Nellie. “I left it right here, next to my brush, and now it’s gone.”

“Dunno,” shrugged Nellie, keeping her eyes fixed on the monitoring screen. A half-eaten package of oolaga candy sat on her stomach and
Star Heat
was on. Nothing else mattered.

“No one’s been in this room except you,” insisted Tana, her voice rising. “C’mon Kinnan, tell me where you put it.”

“It’s just a stupid badge.” Nellie belched loudly and patted her stomach. “Don’t get so uptight. Probably one of your friends borrowed it. Or Duikstra.”

“Why would Duikstra take it?” demanded Tana.

Nellie could hear her roommate starting to hyperventilate. Sneaking a satisfied grin, she continued to stare at the monitoring screen. She hadn’t taken the badge, but she certainly understood why Tana was upset about losing it. The 99 Badge was one of the most coveted awards an Advanced cadet could earn. Bestowed upon those who’d made ninety-nine maze runs without substantial errors, only a small minority achieved it. Nellie was keeping careful track of her own successful runs and was currently at thirty-eight. Not bad for a twelve-year-old, and it was pretty much a certainty she would earn her own 99 Badge well before she turned sixteen, Tana’s age.

Still, her roommate was justifiably proud of the triangular gold badge she’d been given. She took it everywhere and had the unfortunate habit of frequently misplacing it. One of Advanced’s sharpest thinkers in a maze, Tana seemed to disconnect the main hook-up to her brain as soon as she completed a run. She was always forgetting where she’d left things. As a result, Nellie had to endure some version of this accusation scene at least once a week. Most of the time it was completely unfounded. Unless, of course, she’d gotten
really
bored and needed the adrenalin rush.

“You never know,” Nellie said silkily. “Maybe it was Duikstra. Maybe she secretly fantasizes about being a sexy 99-Badge-level maze runner.” She gave her roommate a slit-eyed grin. It made her look like a cat and she knew Tana hated it.

Pressing further into the gap between her dresser and closet, her roommate glared furiously. Her green eyes were narrowed, her lips sucked in and her red curly hair fairly radiated from her scalp. “Duikstra wouldn’t take it,” she hissed. “And neither would any of my friends. They know how important it is to me.”

“Well, it wasn’t my friends,” shrugged Nellie. “Lierin’s the only one who can pass the beam and she wouldn’t take your germie little badge.”

“Course not,” Tana said pointedly. “She’s a Temple.”

Nellie sucked in her breath. She had to hand it to Tana — the girl never missed an opportunity to jab in the knife, one of the traits of a functional cadet. Sitting up, Nellie gave her roommate a docile smile. “Did you check under your pillow?”

“Why would I check under my pillow?” Tana snapped.

“Isn’t that where you put it when you go to beddie-bye?” purred Nellie. “So none of your bad dreams can come steal it from you?” Sticking her thumb in her mouth, she turned back to
Star Heat.

A loud scrape sounded as Tana shoved furiously at the barricade. Then she swept her arm across the top of Nellie’s dresser, shoving several textbooks to the floor.

“You bitch!” shrieked Nellie, scrambling from her bed.

“It was you!” Tana shrieked back, sweeping the dresser’s surface again with her arm. A hairbrush and tube of toothpaste tumbled to the floor. “You’re nothing but a slimy Cat, Kinnan. All Cats think like the gutter, the stars say so.”

The hoped-for adrenalin hit Nellie full force. Running straight at Tana’s dresser, she rammed it with her shoulder. The dresser rocked back and forth, its high-back mirror swaying dangerously. “The stars never said anything like that!” Nellie bellowed, glaring at her roommate. “They love Cats. Cats are their
special
children.”

“Cats are guttersnipes,” Tana hissed, leaning toward her. “
Thieves.
You were born into garbage and toxic waste, Kinnan. No matter how many times you’re reborn, you’ll never be anything but a damn Cat.”

Stars exploded across Nellie’s brain. Backing up, she rammed Tana’s dresser a second time and was rewarded with a satisfying crash as a curling iron and can of hair spray hit the floor. “I’ll be a star,” she shouted, shoving the dresser again and again. No one insulted the Cat caste,
no one
. “I’m never coming back to be reborn. I’m going to live in the heavens with the Goddess.”

“You, a
star
?” Taking several steps back, Tana gave a high-pitched titter. “The Goddess would spit on you, Kinnan. Haven’t you heard She’s allergic to cats?”

A scream ignited at the base of Nellie’s brain. Backing up a third time, she climbed onto her bed for extra leverage. Then she launched herself, barreling toward the barricade and leaping onto the top of her dresser. Her hands hit the mirror, breaking it from its hinges and toppling it onto the floor on Tana’s side of the room. Glass shattered, scattering everywhere. As the crash resounded, the fury at the base of Nellie’s brain exploded, surging in a mass of energy through the top of her head. For a second she could see it, a brilliantly condensed star zooming through the air, and then it passed directly into Tana’s chest. Without a sound, the girl crumpled to the floor.

Several feet above Nellie’s head the security alarm went off, but she remained crouched on her dresser, staring at her roommate’s body. Blood trickled from several cuts on Tana’s arms and face, but that was from broken glass and didn’t explain why she was out cold. Was she dead? But how? Nellie hadn’t been within striking distance. Was it possible to kill someone just by being angry at her?

Stupid with fear, Nellie clung to her dresser, not even blinking as Duikstra came rushing through the doorway, followed by two men in Detta uniform. Dropping to his knees beside Tana, one of the men slipped a Flesh Healer from his belt and began running it over her cuts as the other used a small device to scan her body for vital signs. Abruptly the second man nodded at Duikstra and a look of relief crossed the woman’s face. As she saw it, Nellie’s terror collapsed so intensely that she almost blacked out. So Tana wasn’t dead. That meant she would be fine — the Flesh Healer would take care of the cuts. A huge sigh heaved through Nellie and her thoughts began to move again. Well, okay, if it was clear the snot-nosed bitch was going to make it, why didn’t Duikstra turn off the bloody alarm? She was just standing there as if she was on some kind of holiday, and the sound was almost peeling off the top of Nellie’s head. How was anyone supposed to—?