Hadrian helps Demetri stow his trunk aboard the old, cold, grimy Eurynasir and meets Juno, Demetri’s wife. Hadrian mistakes Demetri’s playful title of “my lady” for actual nobility, revealing his lingering aristocratic habits, while Juno’s modified Jaddian appearance signals that Hadrian is leaving the controlled world of Imperial society.

Bassem announces through the ship that the passenger is aboard, and Demetri orders an immediate departure without waiting for traffic control. As Demetri leads Hadrian through the ship, Hadrian sees other crew members and learns the Eurynasir has a small crew: Juno, Bassem, the twins, Doctor Sarric, Saltus, and Demetri himself.

On the way to the bridge, Hadrian meets Saltus, a small homunculus crewman. Saltus cheerfully says Hadrian is like him because both are “children of the tanks,” but Hadrian reacts with anger and revulsion, rejecting any comparison between an aristocratic palatine and a bred laborer. Demetri silences Saltus, making clear that Hadrian’s status as a paying passenger matters more than Saltus’s insult.

On the bridge, Bassem pilots the ship out across the water and upward, having closed the comms to avoid traffic control chatter. The dome shielding closes, cutting off Hadrian’s final view of Delos, and the ship accelerates so violently that Hadrian is crushed into his seat until the engines cut out and weightlessness takes over.

Once in orbit, Demetri checks for any response to the unauthorized launch and mentions relying on codes supplied by the lady who arranged the passage. The dome opens onto space, and Hadrian is overcome by joy and loss, recalling Gibson’s warning that joy is dangerous. When the suppression field activates, the sudden artificial weight makes Hadrian nauseated, and Juno helps him with a bag.

The crew discusses Hadrian’s destination: he will be put “under the ice” until planetfall on Teukros, then delivered to Nov Senber to join the scholiasts, whom Bassem calls the “hudr.” Bassem reacts with disgust, accusing scholiasts of mutilating their minds with technology, but Hadrian defends them and says they are better than the Chantry. Demetri ends the argument by reminding Bassem that the job pays nine thousand and requires only that they deliver Hadrian.