The sound that woke Iven was someone knocking with the flat of a hand, trying to be heard without making an alarm of it.
He sat up in the unfamiliar room. Morning light lay in a narrow stripe between the shutters. His coat hung where he had left it; the appointment paper was still beneath his own account on the table. For a moment he could not remember whether he had promised to be somewhere before dawn.
Then he remembered the relief arrangements. He had been permitted to sleep. Other people had opened the lanes.
“Come in.”
Rysa entered with her cap in one hand. Sweat had flattened her hair above her ears.
“They took Six.”
He put his feet on the floor. “When?”
“Five forty. A supply detachment. They had a release order with the deputy’s seal. We showed them the clinical assignment. They read it. Then they loaded the unit anyway.”
