"Love truth, but pardon error." — Voltaire

Achille drummed fingertips on his throne in polite applause, saluting a group of aerial dancers executing a three-dimensional triskelion before the royal dais. "Were you able to establish contact?"

"No." Nyssa sighed, keeping her eyes on the performance. "I tuned the lattice's resonance to a frequency the TARDIS should be able to detect. But he has to be listening. Or perhaps he's too far away." She had to give the Doctor the benefit of doubt.

"I confess I find it difficult to fathom how a bosom friend could strand you thus without a word."

"A friend only, Highness." Her smile was wistful. "Unfortunately, I can. He hates goodbyes."

"Commending you to my custody, in considerable danger."

"Nonsense," she said. "For me, this hardly counts as danger. You're the one in peril."

"I must praise the gods for entrusting me with so steadfast a Minerva." He reached across their armrests, laying his hand over hers. "Have a care lest I begin to love thee overmuch."

Adyton cleared his throat behind them. "Majesties…"

Achille drew his hand away at once. "Well, my dear, on the presumption that your champion may not return, we needs must take thought for your future. I fear you have sacrificed all too much for mine."

"I will take no such thought, for it is based on an improbability." For a moment, Nyssa lost the soothing sense of well-being that permeated the Basilica. She stifled an irrational longing for the TARDIS hum. "In the meantime, being here is hardly a sacrifice. The Basilica is one of the most marvelous places I've ever seen."

"High praise, from one who has traversed the firmament."

"Yes." Traversed. The past tense troubled her more than she cared to admit. She tried to refocus her attention on a flurry of youngsters chasing one another overhead, garbed as personifications of the rainbow. What must it have been like, to grow up in a place where walking on the ceiling was not merely an exercise of the imagination? "Speaking of travels, I'd like to accompany you on your next trip to the Healing Hives of Hygieia."

"Mother would ordain you in a heartbeat. She's quite taken with you, you know."

"I'm sorry." The Queen Dowager had embarrassed both of them with an effusive blessing almost before Achille could deliver the happy news.

The performance was drawing to a close. As the variable tempo resolved into a triumphant chord, the dancers unwound their interlocking figures into a stairstep pattern angled downward towards the dais. They froze in elaborate tableau, outstretched arms forming an undulating wave linking the High Hierophant to the heavens.

"There is nothing in this for which you need apologise, dear lady." Rising, he clapped his hands. "Salute the light!" he cried in a high, clear voice. "Apollo oriens!"

"Etiam Minerva!"

Nyssa rose with him, settling her hand upon his wrist. Together, they strode out onto shimmering air, ascended to the top of the invisible ladder, pivoted en pointe to face one another, and began to circle. The dancers and the rest of the court spiraled in around them like planets coalescing around a newborn star. No diamond rain embellished this occasion, but the waterfall draped over the ceiling added a pleasant plashing during gaps in the music.

For a time, the complexities of dance and the effortless grace of her partner afforded Nyssa a refuge from second thoughts. It was indeed restful here, the polar opposite of the turmoil that had engulfed her life since meeting the Doctor. She would not mind basking in the Basilica's tranquility for a season or two. Nevertheless, despite her feigned bravado, she knew the danger had not ended when Apollo symbolically banished the chaos of Dionysos from his domain. There was a serpent somewhere in this garden, perhaps more than one.

The body of the gunman had not been found. It was an unobstructed fall from the balcony to the river at the bottom of the canyon. Unless the body had snagged on something underwater, it ought to have turned up in one of the weirs shielding the turbines that helped power the Basilica. There was no record of an escape via transmat, but if someone possessed the skill to override the network's lockdown codes, then they could have covered their tracks.

If only the Doctor were here. He would have traced the assassin before the scent grew cold. She knew enough of his methods to make a start, but protocol boxed her in quite as effectively as a prison cell. It was impossible to leave Achille's side long enough to conduct an investigation, especially with so many curious eyes following her every move. All she could do was surreptitiously watch the watchers, searching for any signs of resentment or subterfuge. Not easy, with so many wearing masks.

There was no telling when the Doctor might return. Until then, she had to absorb all she could of the world in which she found herself, starting with her unexpected consort.

"I have a question," she said.

The Hierophant gave her a gentle nudge, reminding her that the figures reversed when the music changed from an odd to even tempo. "Anything that is in my power to grant."

She smiled. "I only wondered what your name meant."

"Ah, that." He sounded pleased. "It means a son who outgrew his mother's hopes. Do you not recognise it?"

"It sounds human, but I can't place it."

"Achilles at Skyros. A legend of ancient Earth."

"You shall have to tell it to me later, then."

"Not so, my inquisitive Minerva." His eyes were mischievous behind his mask. "I shall dance it for you. And you alone shall see."

Striding briskly to the console, the Doctor slapped the door control hard to shut himself in. His shoulder twinged in protest. Gritting his teeth at the reminder of a night he would rather forget, he shucked off his eyemask and cloak and tossed them onto the hatrack. They hung there like limp Mardis Gras souvenirs, offending the dignity of the console room. That would never do. Snatching them down again, he pushed through the inner door and headed for the sanctuary of his own quarters, stripping along the way since there was no one else to see. Tearing off the ridiculous doublet tweaked his shoulder again, but it was a cleaner pain than the dull ache between his hearts. He did not glance at the door to Nyssa's room as he passed by.

A short time later, he returned to the control room, restored to his usual cricketing outfit and a more composed frame of mind. Whistling to himself as he circled the console, he took the time to perform a few routine checks that he normally omitted before take-off. But he ignored the flashing light on the communications console.

Yes, he was alone again, for the first time since regenerating. And for how many hundreds of years before that? It must have been after he parted from Leela, the last person he had expected to forsake adventures for love. Even then, he had not been altogether alone. Perhaps he should construct another K-9 unit to keep him company.

Or perhaps not. He had begun this life in a crowded TARDIS, spending his first year shepherding strays and orphans. It might be refreshing to travel solo for a while.

"And besides," he said, patting the console, "You're all the company I need, old girl."

He began to key in an open-ended departure sequence, allowing the TARDIS to choose their next destination. That indicator light was still blinking insistently. He started to answer it, shook his head, and moved to the dematerialisation controls.

The irrevocable choom of the time rotor's downstroke was sweeter music than any geometric sonata.

By her fifth sunset, Nyssa had acclimated to the musical rhythms of the Basilica. It was not difficult to feel at home, as the Doctor had predicted, where servants and automated systems coddled one's every need. Life here was beautiful, mannered and orderly. Even the court's odd predilection for dance, etiquette expressed in mannered poses, held a certain aesthetic logic. Not that she wasn't relieved to escape the Basilica's exacting pomp on the rare occasions when she and Achille managed to steal an hour's stroll in the sky.

Or a half hour's dance. For a practice hall, they ascended to one of the highest spans in the Basilica, fenced from prying eyes by a double line of trees. Nyssa was delighted to find a partner who could appreciate the formalities of Traken court dance, while he enjoyed teaching her the Basilica's complex mathematical sequences. But sometimes they just walked together, trading stories. Achille was agreeable company. Nyssa found herself opening up about Traken, unearthing memories of peaceful times that had been too painful to recall until now.

Today, however, it was Achille's turn to regale her, inspired by a bird that had swooped down and made off with Nyssa's owl-mask. The High Hierophant had finished up spread-eagled on his back, grinning up at her with mask askew, playing the part of a victim toppled by a chalice falling out of a tree. "…And at the last, rather than admit he had purloined the cup from the vault in the first place, the Burgrave was obliged to lodge formal charges against the winged thief. Who, being well-versed in the art of camouflage by conformity, was never discovered."

Chuckling, Nyssa offered him a hand up. "I can only conclude that you issue transmat keys to your avian residents," she said. "Maybe I should submit my petition for a key while wearing that feathered robe I wore for the Coronation."

"Dear lady, does that still vex you?" He stroked the back of her glove, which concealed no key beneath it now. "I am sorry. For all my powers of persuasion, you are still an unknown quantity in my… in our people's equations. We shall pose it to the Council once they have grown more accustomed to the beguiling offworlder who has, they say, bewitched my reason."

"Beguiling." She pursed her lips. "That's an insidious line of attack."

"I shall endeavour to prove I am not ruled by woman's wiles."

"And meanwhile, I suppose I had better play the part of demure consort." She sighed. "It's a beautiful birdcage, Your Highness, but it's hard to search for clues without freedom of movement."

"Leave the investigation to my worthy Adyton. He is already stricken to the marrow that you intervened as my defender. Grant him the dignity of apprehending the culprit." Taking her hand, he drew her gently between two trees to the glimmering railing. From this high vantage point the whole Basilica fanned out below them in heaped-up prisms, as if sunlight had been crystalised into the opposite of an iceberg. "But come. Is that truly what you behold, a cage? I supposed… I dared hope that you found delight in our aerial domain."

"Oh, I do." She shivered. The dizzying drop reminded her of her scuffle with the assassin. Still, it would be a pity to let that spoil the breathtaking splendour laid out before her. "I told you: it's one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. I could get used to living here."

"That is well, since you are my wife!" Seeing her expression falter, he folded his hands around hers. "All that is mine is yours now, dear lady. Remember that, and claim it as your own."

"All except for Ad— oh, good evening, Holy Mother." Stepping back from the balustrade, she offered a simple reverence to the stately matron gliding towards them like a ship under full sail.

"Sorry to interrupt, children," the Queen Dowager said. "The Laconian delegation has arrived early, and the ex-Regent thought to spare His Holiness the trouble of receiving them, since he's been handling their portfolio up until now."

Achille hissed through his teeth. "I see. My thanks, Pia Mater. I shall go at once. My Queen?" He offered her his elbow.

"I'd like a word with Her Grace," said Rhea.

Achille hesitated. "Mother—"

"Don't tell me you're so besotted that you can't bear to discharge a simple reception in the absence of your new good-luck charm."

Privately, Nyssa suspected that the barb was wishful thinking on the Dowager's part. She had been pulling strings to ensure the royal couple were never apart. Which made this private audience surprising. "If the Holy Mother has need of me, then by your leave I shall join you for dinner." Nyssa bobbed a correct courtesy to Achille.

"Very well. I shall send an escort to convey you down to the feast-hall." He raised her wrist to his lips. "Take care lest the birds carry off my fairest jewel."

He vanished. Nyssa tilted her head at Rhea and waited, assuming a posture that was at once more businesslike and more casual.

"No word from the Doctor, then?"

"No." Nyssa shook her head. "I'm sorry. I'm afraid we cannot count on his help, now." It stung to say it.

Rhea's eyes were shrewd behind her terracotta mask, an old-fashioned likeness of a severe goddess. "I'm not surprised. He may not be such a chevalier galant in this incarnation, but the man still has his pride."

Nyssa grimaced. "I know. I wish I could've left him a note, explained—"

"Why you flew straight from the Doctor's arms to my son's private chambers? Nothing would've sufficed. And a missive might have been intercepted." Rhea flapped a hand. "It's done. He's gone."

"Perhaps so." Nyssa did not want to believe it. But it was hardly the first time the staircase of her life had burned away behind her, turning a moment's parting into forever. As always, all she could do was keep moving forward. Taking a long breath, she moved resolutely back to the railing, gazing down past the Basilica to the billowing mists rising out of the dark chasm below their feet. There were ghostly lights twinkling through the fog. Some sort of bioluminescence, or were there dwellings farther down?

"It's beginning to sink in at last, is it?" Rhea said. "The staggering fortune that's fallen into your lap. Not a bad life, this."

"No, I suppose not," Nyssa admitted, although that was very far from her thoughts. "Nevertheless… forgive me, Holy Mother, but it's not the life's work I'd sought for myself. At least, not since I left Traken. Those lights… are there structures carved into the cliffs?"

"Troglodytes," Rhea said, giving her a considering look. "The servants and maintenance workers for the Basilica live down there."

Nyssa nodded. Tegan had taught her to look for what she did not care to see. The Celestial Basilica floated in the clouds, but its foundations were more earthly. "I should like to visit the lower levels sometime, to inspect the conditions," she said, testing the limits of the cage.

Rhea snorted. "Offworlder," she said, not unkindly. "Well, take it up with your husband. But not for a while, I pray you. We have weightier matters to worry about. We can't count on a Time Lord's timely intervention, as you say. So, have you two children hatched any more bright ideas?"

Nyssa shook her head. "I've been trying to master the transmat network. If I could find some anomaly, anything that could be linked to the assassin's movements during the night before the coronation, I… I mean, the Warder might set up a surveillance program to watch for future incursions."

Rhea eyed her skeptically. "You think you can find something that he and the guardians of the Heavenly Gates have not?"

"Perhaps not," Nyssa said, "but I am more familiar with alien technology than they are. I might be able to tease out that weapon's energy signature. Even a biomarker, some xenocellular residue might provide a clue."

Rhea nodded. "Very well. But that doesn't solve our larger problem, does it?"

Nyssa glanced pensively at the spot where Achille had disappeared. "No. And I confess I'm at a loss. How long do you think we have?"

"Three or four months. I could take you to the Healing Hives for monitoring, but it will be difficult for him to justify staying with you for the duration."

Nyssa fell silent, sorting through a jumble of conflicting thoughts. Beneath his cultivated air of bravura, the Hierophant was in an increasingly precarious position. Soon he would be a sitting target. "Then… perhaps we should allow the assassin another shot at him."

Rhea stiffened. Nyssa shrank from her glare. Had she misjudged the woman's shrewd intelligence? Then the Dowager's proud posture sagged like a crimped stay. "You'll do," she said. "Ah, daughter of Traken, you'll do very well, when the time comes."

"I shall do all I can." Simple words, but a silent credo since Traken's fall.

"So I see." The woman brushed a speck of bark from Nyssa's veil. "Almost I wish you had been my daughter."

Someone was cradling the Doctor's head, while another raised a chalice to his lips. A syrupy-tart taste like stewed apricots spread over his tongue. Too late, he flinched away from the unknown draught. Futile coughing overtook him for a few seconds, long enough for him to register the stern features of the red-robed woman stooping over him.

"You are safe, Time Lord, for all your strivings. Be still."

He fell back weakly against the stone floor of the grotto. "Ohica?" he said. The girl supporting his head gave an angry hiss. "High One," he corrected himself politely. "That's right, you've had a promotion."

"The Time Lord regains his wits. Enough, Meave. Take our sister to a place of rest and return to your duties."

The acolyte bowed, moved to a tattered figure leaning against a column, and led her away.

The Doctor raised his head. "Sister Nalan. She was in a bad way—"

"The Elixir of Life has restored her. She will recover," Ohica said. She set the chalice aside on a stone plinth and frowned. "She says you were alone. Have you not a handmaid of your own to save, that you needs must rescue mine?"

"You're welcome."

Ohica never smiled, but the sternness around her eyes relaxed an iota. "So once again, the Sisterhood are in your debt. What boon would you ask of us this time, Time Lord?"

"Oh, nothing, really. Glad to help. I'll just…" He groaned, head spinning as he tried to stand, and fell back with a thump. "Wait until the Elixir's finished doing whatever it's doing. Powerful kick, hasn't it? Have you considered mixing it with fruit juice?"

Ignoring his inane babble, Ohica stared across the dim chamber to an oxidised metal door through whose cracks shone a flicker of flame. "Silence. You know that your presence in the Holy of Holies is a gross transgression of our laws."

"Oh, absolutely," he said. "So kind of your sisters to carry me and Nalan back here. I'm sure I couldn't have walked."

"I shall scry for you," she said, eyes flashing wide in that peculiar way that reminded him of his old companion, Polly.

"Ah, I'll pass, but thanks all the same," he said. "That's against my people's laws, you know, to learn about our own future."

"I must do as the Flame bids," Ohica said severely, "just as you must do what is in your nature, whatever the laws that forbid it. Attend." Crossing her hands over her heart, she moved to stand before the screen shielding their holy of holies. "I see flames," she said slowly, eyes half-closing.

"A lot of them about," he said, attempting to sit up again.

"I see a burning ship of the air."

He tensed. "The TARDIS?" he asked in spite of himself.

"Nay. A palace that floats mid-sky."

That was almost worse. "The Celestial Basilica?" he said. "No. don't answer that. Ohica, stop this. Whatever you have to tell me, I'm sure it can wait until you can say, 'I told you so.' I promise I'll be properly chagrinned."

The woman droned on, unheeding. "Your companion will die there. Your companion will not die there. The Web of Time shudders."

"Enough." He really needed to start carrying earplugs along with all the other bric-a-brac in his pockets. "I didn't ask—"

"No, you did not. You decided." The woman's eyes snapped open. Her face was graven and pitiless. "But the Sacred Flame bids me ask: what is it that would move you to defy the Web of Time?"

Bewildered, groggy and alarmed, he shook his head. "I have no idea," he said. "Hope, perhaps?"

Ohica snorted. "Hope."

"You should try it sometime, High One," he said. "I know hope's hard to come by when you can just flip to the last page and take a peep, but you can't let a little thing like predestination get in the way of a good story. You can never be sure. Tea leaves get soggy, crystal balls go foggy, sacred flames—"

"You know the answer to the Flame's riddle. But you fear it, and so you call it by another name." She turned her back on him and waved towards a dark opening. "Your TARDIS is there. Go, Doctor, and seek your so-called hope. I pray you do not discover the taste of ashes before you find it. "

The High Hierophant had been wise to present Nyssa's suggestions for improving transmat security as his own, arrived at in consultation with the Warder. Even so, there were knowing smiles around the council chamber as of elders listening tolerantly to a child's enthusiasms. He pretended not to notice. "Since my brother saw fit to disrupt the coronation…"

"With respect, Your All-Holiness," said Acheron, "There is scarce more evidence to link Auguste's hand to this attack than there was to the poison that cleared your way to the throne."

Achille raised his hand to forestall angry murmurs. "Pray let him speak. We shall not flinch at facts, however they are glossed."

"My thanks," Acheron said, half-bowing. "Auguste's culpability was in sufficient doubt that your sire never judged it proved, despite the zeal of this Council to expel him and embrace a younger, more malleable monarch." He gazed placidly around the chamber, a tipped bowl with the Hierophant's throne at the highest point.

Nyssa, enthroned at Achille's left hand on a level just below his, glanced past him to the tall man seated on his right. Acheron's chair floated a step below hers, but his head was level with the Hierophant's, making it difficult to see anything of his face below his mask. She filed a mental note while Achille waited for the uproar to settle.

"I appreciate your frank assessment, uncle, however unflattering. But my abduction? Was that, too, unproven?"

"Be not blinded by Auguste's misguided attempt to secure a private audience with you and plead his case. You came to no harm by his hands."

"The Priestesses of Hygieia might dispute you," Achille said. "Had the Lord Doctor and Lady Jo not returned me to their care so quickly—"

"Forgive me, Your All-Holiness." Acheron lowered his head and shoulders. "All my sister-sons are dear to me, and it is grievous to me that five noble scions have been reduced to one slender wand of hope."

"But surely, Your Excellency," Nyssa said, forgetting her promise to play silent obsever, "there is no question about the assassin's identity? The Warder saw him face to face."

Mutters from several Councillors reminded her of woman's place in the hierarchy.

"Was the gunman's face unmasked?" Acheron countered.

The Hierophant frowned. "I like not this line of inquiry, uncle."

"Your Holiness, while you have no issue, the flower of the Basilica balances on a delicate stem. Your safety becomes our first principle, after Truth. We cannot afford to neglect any line of inquiry. Therefore, I must ask: did or did not the Warder see him to know him? Let the man speak."

"Well, Warder?" the Hierophant said.

Adyton cleared his throat from behind the thrones where he stood watch. "He sported the half-mask of a Person of Mark," he said, "and his voice was very like the Lord Auguste's."

"But you cannot be certain," Acheron persisted. "And what evidence, Warder, have you amassed to show an attempt was made on the High Hierophant's life?"

"An offworlder weapon was found at the very spot where the Lord Doctor scuffled with the stranger and, according to witnesses, was struck with an energy discharge consistent with his injuries. We presume the weapon belonged to the Queen's abductor. Nonetheless, some eyewitnesses assert it was the property of the Lord Doctor," he said, "who quit the field with strange and sudden discourtesy before I could question him."

"The Doctor never carries weapons!" Nyssa burst out as the chamber erupted a third time.

Achille rose to his feet, right hand resting casually on his sword-hilt. The hubbub died away at once.

"I owe the Lord Doctor my life," he said in a high, clear voice. "And I will tolerate insult against my own person, but not my lady the Queen's. Have a care, old friend, what you suggest." Nyssa could not see the Warder stiffen behind them, but she could hear his indrawn breath. By calling him friend while calling him out, Achille had both honoured and humiliated him before the whole Council.

A fabrication. That was what was being suggested, a dangerous idea to sow among the Council's sharpest minds. If the thwarted assassination attempt was staged, then its aim had been to bring Nyssa to the Hierophant's attention in a spectacularly favourable light. The widely-celebrated consequence of that encounter was her emergence from the royal bedchamber the next morning.

She could not quell gossip, but she could and must stop Acheron from using her to drive a wedge between Achille and his devoted shadow. "Your Highness, precision with facts does not insult me. But this much is certain: the Warder will not rest until he has laid hands on those who mean you harm. I pray we grant him whatever facility might aid that endeavour."

Her interruption drew titters around the room, but it had the desired effect. Achille inclined his head. "Indeed. Setting aside for now the ongoing inquiry, let us return to the question of girding the Heavenly Gates…"

The transmat network upgrade passed with little debate, framed as a means to keep offworlder tools of violence from disrupting the peaceful harmony of the Basilica. It was difficult to screen for every form of focused energy weapon, but sadly, Nyssa's travels had given her a fair idea what to look for.

The Council ground on, tackling mundane matters from the budget for an upcoming religious festival to a spiritual conundrum that was stoking heated debate among the Basilica's philosophers. Nyssa resumed her discreet observations, noting who might have the skill to alter transmat records. She almost managed to keep silent for the remainder of the meeting, until talk turned to the construction of a new solar energy storage facility to be embedded in the cliffs below the palace.

Nyssa could not help herself. "Isn't that a residential area?"

"Troglodytes." The Minister of Energy waved the word aside with a handkerchief he was using to punctuate his speech. "A fortnight will be more than sufficient to clear the area of obstructions."

"I beg your pardon, Minister," she said. "The Basilica's mastery of gravitic fields is unparalleled, but I believe there may be ways to improve battery efficiency and transmission by an order of magnitude. On Traken, the Source—"

Acheron chuckled. "It seems, Your Holiness, that your consort will be the power behind the throne as surely as was my sister."

"Truths may out, uncle, from unlikely vessels."

"So I have observed," Acheron said with a slight emphasis that made Nyssa wonder.

"Very well." the Hierophant said. "I defer final approval, until my Minerva has had an opportunity to review our storage facilities and suggest refinements from Traken's technick arts. Let us move to the charter for the Artificers Guild…"

She felt both annoyance and relief as everyone in the Council promptly dismissed her presence again. Almost everyone, that is. Acheron's knowing smile widened for a split second as she glanced towards him.

She did not see what he saw: the Warder's dour gaze fixed upon her back.

Three months. Three months it had taken the Doctor to stage a successful prison break, and some of his fellow slaves had died under the gears of their metal guards. Three months of stewing over Ohica's dire pronouncements. Three months of mentally reciting double dactyls and solving quintic equations and reviewing the entire history of the Harappan civilisation and anything else to keep from going mad during the long, bruising hours of dritium mining. Nyssa had left just in time. She might not have survived this.

He levered away the last of the rubble and squeezed through a gap to the welcome sight of the TARDIS looming out of the darkness. Opening the door, he found himself nearly blinded by the light streaming out. Freedom at last. Hurrying inside, he whispered a fervent, "Hello, old girl," and set her in motion.

He barely reached his own bed before collapsing. He should have enjoyed a deep healing sleep, cocooned in a time bubble safe aboard his ship, but Ohica's words tainted his dreams. He saw the Basilica ablaze, sinking from its moorings like an enormous punctured balloon, small figures falling forever from its upper reaches. Dead but not dead. Zeno's paradox kept swallowing them like an impotent black hole, forever drawing them in. The Web of Time buzzed like an angry hive, a lattice of tortured minds pleading for him to come back, come back, come back, trying to ensnare him with the face of every companion he had left behind. Adric's freighter exploded again and again in a shrinking timeloop.

He awoke drenched in sweat.

Ohica's words rattled inside his skull. The Web of Time, shaken. It was a clear warning that he should keep well away. And yet, after a shower to scrape off the dust of the mines, he found himself hunched over the TARDIS databank, scanning fragmentary history files.

"I don't think I could live with myself, never knowing," he muttered. He had once pleaded the same excuse to Nyssa, his curiosity nearly destroying Traken several thousand years before she was born.

He found what he sought almost at once: a friend's name enshrined in history like a fly caught in amber. The instant those impersonal lines of text appeared, he cursed himself for letting Ohica's taunts sway his better judgment. He had violated his self-imposed rule never to seek after old companions. It was a cornerstone of Time Lord philosophy, that their observations caused an event to become fixed. He had long considered it a fallacy of Gallifreyan imperialism, an arrogant assumption of one's own importance relative to the rest of the universe. Still, it was hard to shake off that sinking guilt, a pang of responsibility whenever he stumbled across a friend's future. Flux transmuted into fact. Heisenberg may have slept here, as the old Earth joke went, but it stopped being funny when one found Heisenberg's name in the hotel register.

The Doctor read the databank entry twice, trying to feel proud of Nyssa instead of angry. "A waste. I was sure she was meant for—"

For what? For greatness? For a noble self-sacrifice, which he had dreaded all along? Some worthwhile cause? They had done so much good together. But she lacked his years. He could not expect her to give up all her remaining days to selfless causes. And anyway, why did this preclude her making a difference? The Celestenes were an enlightened society, but by no means a perfect one.

Nyssa Minerva, the first ruling queen in the history of the Celestial Basilica. Not a bad epitaph, really.

The important thing was that he could stop fretting over a prophecy that he should never have taken seriously. Feeling like he had won a victory of a sort, if only over that pompous priestess of Karn, he forced himself to tackle some housekeeping he'd been putting off. It was time to jettison a niggling source of annoyance.

Nyssa's room could go into digital storage with Susan's suite and Romana's library and all the rest. Picturing himself in the livery of a 17th century coachman, he archived it under the password "Cinderella."

The throne room was a more intimate space than the aerial ballroom, if one considered a church more intimate than a cathedral. Nyssa normally shared the raised dais at one end with the High Hierophant, but this evening's festivities called for her to spectate while Achille performed the tale of Achilles at Skyros before her appreciative gaze. In this pantomime, his mother played the part of Thetis, hiding the boy among the ladies-in-waiting of a king's daughter. He wore a handmaiden's disguise. It was an unusual myth to be reenacted at the Basilica, where division of the sexes was strictly demarcated by custom and costume. Then again, this Hierophant was an unusual young man. His laughing eyes winked at her from behind a maiden's mask, a veil hiding the neat goatee beginning to grow back after the Coronation.

His dancing was virtuoso yet demure. She was amused to see he had incorporated some of her own mannerisms, adding Trakenite grace notes to the Celestenes' mathematical progressions. Even so, his vigorous movements did not quite match the willowy forms surrounding him, their fluttering white veils streaming out on a faint breeze allowed to permeate the walls. The dancers scattered flower petals, touched palms and circled. Every minute movement was perfectly synchronised, expressing beauty through circumscribed sameness.

Into this feminine enclave strode an armed warrior clad in dusty cloak and boots. He carried a rolled carpet over his shoulder. The maidens gave way before him, opening a wide space for him to throw down his burden. It unrolled across the dance floor with a muffled clatter, disgorging bright bolts of patterned silk, jewellery, small silver bells and flutes. Two items did not fit the assemblage: a short sword and an archaic helm.

The ladies-in-waiting reached for adornments and musical instruments. Laughing, they began to dance again, bells tingling out a silvery counterpoint to their steps. But Achille reached for the helm, spinning away to shed his maiden's mask and drop the face-plate over his eyes in one smooth motion that kept his features concealed. Then he snatched up the sword. Twirling free of his gown and flinging it aside, he began to dance in earnest, stripped nearly to the waist where a wide sash bore his solar emblem over his belly. Beads of sweat stood out on the paint that gilded his lean chest and arms. It was a fierce, martial display. Nyssa found herself captivated by the spinning leaps, the controlled wildness of his frame, the powerful steps striking the floor like hammer on anvil. Finally, with a shout, he broke from the centre of the circle, catapulted from the stage and rolled at Nyssa's feet, where he came up on one knee and offered her the sword. Caught up in the drama, she set her right hand over the hilts in a gesture of blessing, to a roar of applause.

"A true tale," he whispered, chest heaving. "My mother hid me among her priestesses after my eldest three brothers were slain. It was not until I took this name, danced as Achille before the whole Basilica, that the court warmed to my claim for the throne." He shivered, and the sword wavered on his outstretched arms.

"I understand." She released the sword. "You know, I think it might be an idea for us to visit your 'Skyros' now, and not wait until—"

There was an odd buzzing crack. Something whizzed past her shoulder swifter than sight. One of the dancers, crossing the spot where Achille had been just moments ago, gave a cry and crumpled. Nyssa ducked in a rush of terror and clarity, the kind she had not felt since leaving the Doctor. His sword dropped with a clang. She barely had time to fear the worst before Achille had seized her, yanked her down beside him and covered her as another bullet shattered the stylised owl's face on her throne's headrest.

The thundering roar of water rising up the shaft meant the Doctor only had seconds to spare. He threw himself at the last security lock. Logarithmic, of course. It was just as well he didn't believe in fate. Otherwise, he'd think it was mocking him. Now that she was gone, he could admit to himself that Nyssa was better at solving these kinds of puzzles.

"I cannot believe," he grumbled, punching at the keys, "you'd give up all of time and space for that prancing popinjay…"

All of time and space, including the rising flood that was currently engulfing an army of cyborg horrors in the undercity. He had rather underestimated the size of that reservoir.

"Ow!" Something sharp had stung his fingers. There was no time to find out what. He could see the water gobbling up the ladder two stories below. He needed a shortcut— a stroke of genius— yes! The keypad chimed. The bulkhead above him opened. He lunged through it. The bulkhead crashed shut beneath his feet, sealing itself for good this time. Another ladder rose up to the promise of daylight high above him. He resumed the ascent, arms aching.

Halfway up, he finally stopped to inspect his itching fingers. A light frosting of silvery wires had encased two of them like Chinese finger puzzles. With sudden dread, he started to tear at the filaments, thought better of it, tugged down the cuff of his coat as a crude safety glove and tried again. The wires snapped and tore, drawing blood where they had bitten into his skin. Not too deep, not yet. They were tunnelling just under the epidermis. But they were growing at an alarming rate.

"That does it," he muttered.

Booming thunder echoed up the shaft, a reminder of the enormous water pressure hammering against the seals. The ladder shook. He climbed faster.

The itching was creeping across his palm. He could not die like this. He could not regenerate like this, either. If his body did not expel the implants, they would just keep spreading.

He would humble his pride. He needed someone skilled in bioelectronics to excise the nanofibres. Someone with small, nimble fingers and a sharp eye. Someone who would not waste time with questions or suspicion, because at this speed of growth he would soon look like those poor wretches he had just drowned. He only hoped the Basilica's stifling protocol would grant him a royal audience before it was too late.

Adyton lunged around the thrones like a charging elephant. "Refugium!" he barked, the emergency command to send the High Hierophant to the safety of the royal apartments.

"Belay." Achille spoke over him, scrabbling for Nyssa's hand.

"Just go!" she said. His key overruled the need for palm-to-palm contact, but it still required a firm grip to activate tandem transport. He clasped her wrist. The room dissolved. Shouts and cries of horror faded away.

They materialised outside his private rooms in a heap. A servant carrying linens through the antechamber nearly tripped over them. Her eyes widened at the sight of the royal couple tangled together. She emitted an apologetic squeak, curtseyed deeply, and fled before they could collect themselves.

Achille made an odd sputtering noise, halfway between an oath and laughter.

Nyssa was too indignant to notice the maid's flustered retreat. "That was a foolish risk! If you're injured now, we could lose everything."

"I shall be the judge of what I cannot risk losing." Achille raised her to her feet, looking her over. "You're unscathed?"

"Yes, but that dancer—"

"Majesty," Adyton said, voice shaking. He had materialised behind them. All but elbowing Nyssa aside, he set an arm around the young man's shoulders, ushering him through the door that Nyssa opened for them. "If they've touched you, I swear—"

"They have not." To Nyssa, he added, "And my mother will tend the injured until her physickers arrive." He swallowed hard, suffering himself to be led over to a velvet chaise lounge. Sinking onto it, he delivered a sequence of commands with eyes closed. "Heavenly Gates: Basilica lockdown. Limit transmat access to royal keys and the Warder's." There was a chime of confirmation.

"With respect, Your Highness," Adyton said, reaching for his helm, "your well-being is of greater importance than a mere dancer's. Summon the High Priestess of Hygieia at once."

"I am whole," Achille said, waving him off. "To your duty, old friend. Unmask whoever fired those shots."

"My liege, my duty is to guard your person, in which I must not fail a third time." He had regained his wooden composure, but Nyssa thought she saw his eyes flicker in her direction.

Achille struck the gilded backrest with his fist. "At once!"

Adyton wavered for a raw beat, then inclined his head and vanished.

"By the ordered spheres, I do not know what has possessed him," Achille muttered.

"Remember he loves you," Nyssa said gently. This was not the time to remind him that that his right-hand-man harboured doubts about his queen. "It was easier for him when he was only your bodyguard. Now greater duties demand his attention, yet he's reluctant to leave your side."

"Yes. Of course, you are right." The young man's eyes softened. "Patrocle, I used to call him. Another hero from ancient times. Now, help me get this off. However did the Greeks breathe?"

"Here." Together they wrestled with the bronze helm and set it on an end table. Underneath, his face was pale and clammy. "You are injured," she said, reproving. Were all men like this, or just the ones she came to care for? "Show me!"

He shook his head. "Nay, you know what ails me. But I am troubled. Those shots came from behind you. There was no one between you and the wall apart from Adyton."

"Don't even think it."

"I would sooner countenance that all the stars are lies," he said. "But if not he, then how?"

A chime interrupted them. Rhea burst through the double doors, as close to agitated as Nyssa had ever seen her. Nyssa gave way as the priestess moved to her son's side and drew out her staff of office, passing it over him. Her frown deepened as she perused the symbols scrolling along the wand.

"Mother," he said patiently, "I'm fine, as I keep assuring my guardian angels. Tell me what transpired after we took flight."

She fixed Nyssa with a measuring look. "An offworlder weapon was discovered beneath the Queen's throne."

Achille stiffened. "The Queen is innocent!"

Nyssa shook her head in answer to Rhea's tacit query. They had not spoken of her grim suggestion to fake an assassination attempt since their first private meeting. Now, it seemed, there was no need for it. They had a ready-made reason for Achille's retreat from the public eye.

Rhea exhaled. "None shall gainsay it." She placed her hands on their shoulders, bracing them against her next words. "But the Warder has been arrested."

The Doctor pocketed the bloody TARDIS key with distaste. Still peeling leads out of his skin, he hurried over to the console.

That indicator light on the communications panel was blinking again. This time, he did not hesitate. Nyssa's voice poured out from the speakers, heavily distorted by the vortex. It was a wonder she could reach him from so far away. Then again, she had done it before.

"—Achille has been shot. I'll be accompanying him to the Healing Hives of Hygieia. Do listen. Hear me. Please, Doctor. Won't you come? Or just answer back, for old times. It won't take long. Was there any reason not to contact me?"

The Web of Time was the reason, buttressed by his self-imposed rule that he keep going forward, not loop back on his tracks to keep tabs on all those he left behind. But now he had an excuse. A dire need, in fact. He placed his hands over the telepathic circuits, mildly impressed that she had tuned the Basilica's lattice to project the psychic frequency used by Time Lords. "Nyssa!" he said. "Tell me where and when you are."

Nyssa's rambling plea continued through a rising whine of static. "My desires— no, my choice to cease traveling, to settle down and stay in one place, don't mean I would leave our friendship— Hear me!— or your kindness behind."

"Nyssa!" he said again, trying to concentrate.

With a jarring pop, the signal cut out. He stared down at the console in consternation. Of course! The telepathic circuits functioned by touch, and his handprints were changing by the second. There was not a moment to lose. He would go to the Healing Hives to have his own wounds treated. Afterwards, they could flush out the assassin.

He started towards the Fast Return Switch, then stopped, realising that the morning of the Coronation was the wrong place and time. Also, Achille's injury might be the very reason she became the Basilica's first ruling queen. He needed to know her temporal coordinates. More importantly, he had to make sure he was not about to jeopardise her future with a careless intervention that sent history careering on a different track. He moved to the TARDIS database. Surely the assassination attempt would be on record. He skimmed her biography impatiently.

First ruling queen, yes. Her reign had lasted over a hundred years. Best known for establishing the Grove system to house the troglodytes, renamed trakenites in honour of her mother—

"No." He willed his eyes not to see the words.

The first ruling queen, Nyssa Minerva, was named for her mother, who died in childbirth.

He sagged against the console, oblivious to the fine metal filaments burrowing into his cheeks where he rested his face in his hands.

Quantum realities constricted to a fixed point in an instant. The Web of Time was a noose.