“Where,” I repeated, “did you get this?”

Fosyf gave a short laugh. “And single-minded, yes, but I already knew that. I bought it from Captain Hetnys.”

Bought it. This ancient, priceless thing would have been nearly unthinkable as a gift. The idea of anyone taking any amount of money for it was impossible. Still squatting, I turned to Captain Hetnys, who to my unspoken question said, “The owner was in need of cash. She didn’t want to sell it herself because, well, imagine anyone knowing you had to sell something like that. So I brokered the deal for her.”

“And took your cut, too,” put in Raughd, who I suspected wasn’t enjoying being eclipsed by the tea set.

“True,” acknowledged Captain Hetnys.

Even a small cut of that must have been staggering. This wasn’t the sort of thing an individual owned, except perhaps nominally. No living, remotely functional house would allow a single member to alienate something like this. The tea set I had seen, when I had been a brand-new ship not ten years old, had not belonged to an individual. It had been part of the equipment of a decade room of a Sword, brought out while my captain was visiting, to impress her. That one had been purple and silver and mother-of-pearl, and the god named in the inscription had been a different one. And it had read, On the happy and well-deserved occasion of your promotion. Captain Seimorand. And a date a mere half a century before the ascendancy of Anaander Mianaai, before the set had been taken as a souvenir of its owner’s defeat.

I was sure the bottom of the inscription in the box lid now before me had been cut off, that On the happy and well-deserved occasion was only the beginning of the sentence. There was no sign of the cut—the edges of the gold looked smooth, the wood underneath undamaged. But I was sure someone had removed it, cut a strip off the bottom, and put back what was left, centered so that it didn’t look so much as though part of the inscription had been removed.

This wasn’t something passed down for centuries among some captain’s descendants—those descendants would never have removed the name of the ancestor who had left them such a thing. One might remove the name to conceal its origin, and even damaged this was worth a great deal. One might conceal its origin out of shame—anyone who saw it might be able to guess which house had been forced to part with such a treasure. But most families that owned such things had other and better ways to capitalize such possessions. Seivarden’s house, for instance, had accepted gifts and money in exchange for tours of that ancient, captured Notai shuttle.

Stolen antiques, the Sword of Atagaris lieutenant had said. But I had not imagined anything quite like this.