Then they broke character and made this specific effort to interfere with Ambrose's attempted use of offworlders to reach the Singularity. And as they've proven to have the power to cut a doorway even into the heart of your kingdom and leave again without leaving a trace, where they were won't help you find where they are.

[Which Jolene clearly already knows, given her resignation and the fact that his task isn't to track them down, but still. He's had some experience living with the threat of a hidden enemy hanging over his head.]

But in effect they have played their hand, and Thorne hasn't lost as much as it appears. Those of us who chose to remain were the ones who are willing to co-operate. The true successes. The runaways were always an untested, disloyal quantity, and that's all the Free Cities and Solvunn have inherited.

What can you tell me about them? Oliver Abbot and Elizabeth Francis. Their aims, beyond frustrating Thorne. What do they want? I find it hard to believe they were simply protesting Thorne's treatment of its prisoners.