Abernathy tossed the skull into the air, caught it, and hooked her fingers through the eye sockets. “During the package chase I got talking with Cat, and Raz, and a bunch of other people, and talking leads to thinking—about Maura Varg’s mystery client, who hired her to pick up indentures in the Gleb and collect a load of dreamglass in Alt Coulumb, even though dreamglass is illegal there. We asked ourselves where Raz’s tip came from, and I remembered the mysterious gray-eyed girl who set Gabby Jones on the Seril story in the first place. Daphne has—had—gray eyes. Jump in whenever you’re ready.”

“Why? So far I’ve heard only conjecture and spite.”

“You covered your tracks well. Idols paying idols to rent the gray-eyed girl’s apartment. A different set of shell Concerns and Kavekanese mystery cults to hire Varg. But the Talbeg priest who stole this skull had a demon inside him, like the demons in the others, and he sent the skull to you. So that chain leads us at least as far back as Varg.”

“Your chain has flimsy links, Counselor.”

“Did you attack Kos just to cover up your theft?”

“I brought suit,” Ramp said, “because Seril is a weakness at a time we can afford none. Kos and the Iskari are bad enough: gods and their servants prating on as if the Wars never happened, binding simpletons to their service. They’re brake pads on the troika of history. But at least the Craft binds them. With Seril’s return Kos gains new freedom, which slows progress. These gods of yours are a dead end for life on this planet: a disgusting self-centered inversion, music played on the deck of a sinking ship when we should be saving ourselves.” She shrugged. “More to the point, I brought suit because my clients asked me to. You do remember clients? Or has your time among god-botherers replaced fiduciary duty with faith?”

“Is that the game we’re playing? Denials and pushback?”

“You accused me of acting for an ulterior motive. I tell you I had none. But Alexander’s skull is a treasure. Whoever thought to send it to me has my thanks, whatever their methods.”

“Why waste our time? There are no Judges here.”

Ramp sipped wine. “Because I’ve worked against people like you before,” she said.

“Like me.”

“Jumped-up junior Craftswomen with a swollen sense of their superiority to the morally compromised elder generation. You mistake the ability to walk without a parent’s aid for competence. In your world everything has an explanation, an ultimate motive, and all you have to do is dissect and diagram these for a Judge, as if the court were a nanny who could ease your pain. I wouldn’t put it past you to have witnesses on the other end of this link, though it runs against common decency.”