Chapter 7: The Memory Market Under Bermondsey

The map changed on the Northern line.

Mara noticed it between Stockwell and Oval, in the yellow half-light of the carriage, when she tilted the paper to check the thread south of the river and found it had gone. Not faded. Not smudged. Simply redirected — the same thin red line now curving northeast with the calm certainty of something that had always been pointing that way and was only now bothering to mention it.

She folded the map before the man across from her could see it move. He was reading a free newspaper and losing the battle with sleep, and she didn't want to be responsible for his Thursday.