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surveillance detail after I left the night before. After all, both murders had taken place on properties slated to open during the Fire Renewal. It made sense to monitor all the other properties in that category.
    There were three of them. Two, as the gods would have it, were Molpilia projects.
    Cycles earlier, the Emperor had ordered every city in the Empire to set up a network of high-powered surveillance cameras on the roofs of strategically selected buildings. At the time, it was believed he was anticipating another Rebellion.
    The rebellion never happened, but the network came in handy sometimes. This was one of those times.
    The Emperor’s cameras afforded us a level of scrutiny far beyond what the pyramids’ security systems provided. But someone had to monitor the camera feeds. Hence, the detail.
    I went upstairs to see how it was doing.
    When I entered the surveillance center, which was a big room but seemed small because of all the monitors packed into it, I saw that Necalli had Takun, Quetzalli, and Izel on vigil.
    Takun made a face when he saw me. “Necalli wasn’t kidding. You really do look like shit.”
    “What did you do,” said Quetzalli, “try to stop a rail carriage with your face?”
    “Thanks for the sympathy,” I said. “See anything?”
    “Tons,” said Takun, “if the killer’s a squirrel. Otherwise, no.”
    Izel laughed softly. “If we were lucky, Necalli told us, the murderer would show up. If we were really lucky, he would show up before we lost a night’s sleep. Guess what? We weren’t lucky.”
    Of the three of them, Izel looked the worst for wear. But then, he had never been the sturdiest looking guy around.
    He was tall, even a little taller than I was, but skinny to the point where you had to wonder if he ate at all. He looked like he might blow away in a strong wind.
    A nice guy, though. Izel was the one Investigator in the office who always remembered everybody’s birth-gods. Some people said he was too motherly to be an Investigator. Obviously, at least one chief along the line had thought otherwise.
    Whatever the remarks, Izel didn’t seem to mind. In fact, he often made fun of his frailty. He started working for the police, he once told me, because he was tired of getting beaten up.
    Quetzalli, on the other hand, was small and tough. No one in the department wanted to mess with her, me included.
    Looking over her shoulder, I saw that Necalli had given her Tepeyollotl in District Nine, the Molpilia project that Eren’s people had been marching around lately. But they hadn’t shown up yet. One thing I had learned about them was that they liked their sleep.
    I thought about Eren lying in her bed, her long, dark hair fanned across the pillow. Then I thought about me running my fingers through that hair.
    Then I remembered where I was.
    I cleared my throat and said, “Tepeyollotl looks further along than Centeotl.”
    “It is,” said Quetzalli. “All four of its sides were illuminated last night, and its security system is active—a good thing in that neighborhood. All that’s left is some cosmetic work inside.”
    Takun was watching Mayahuel, Molpilia’s other pyramid, in District Eleven. Before I asked, he told me it was in pretty much the same shape as Tepeyollotl.
    “By the way,” he added, “you should try some surveillance work yourself. It will keep you out of trouble.”
    I turned to Izel, who had responsibility for Mixcoatl in District Nineteen. “What about your place?”
    “Well,” he said, “the rent is a little high.”
    “I meant Mixcoatl ,” I said.
    He shrugged. “It’s lagging behind the others. Even if we don’t find a corpse there, it probably won’t open on time.”
    “Maybe because Molpilia’s not the developer,” Quetzalli suggested. “His projects always seem to be right on schedule.”
    “Which is why he’s so pissed off about those murders,” Izel noted.
    Takun sat back in his chair and stretched. “When I was a rookie, I