And kept curving into an expression decidedly more self-satisfied. Her eyes snapped into focus, and Ramp’s grip melted. “You might want to check that contract.” Ramp looked down, and as she watched, a silver-ink stamp took shape. Paid in full. “Work with gods isn’t lucrative from a salary standpoint, no. Especially not work with goddesses in incubation phase. That’s why our forebears invented contingency fees and performance bonuses.” She checked her watch. “I’m late for a meeting. We’ll have to skip the parting-threats phase of the conversation, which is a shame—I’ve never done one of those before. Still have to figure out what to do with this skull, though. Paperweight? Raz mentioned this Old World game with a ball and a flat wooden bat. The kind you hit stuff with, I mean, not the kind with wings. Anyway. Bye.”

Ramp stood in her tower, angry and alone.

*   *   *

The delegation climbed the Godmountain: Ms. Batan from the Two Serpents Group, a few CenConAg emissaries, bodies grown through with vines, a golem bearing the King in Red’s vision-gem. At the rear of the trail, escorted by a Craftsman with a gold watch and skin darker than Tara’s own, strode a thing that looked human, though made from shadow. Lines of darkness trailed fingers that walked a featureless silver disk down and up.

The two-page summary bios the delegations had sent around in advance did not include a first name for this person, or a pronoun of preference, or any other information for that matter.

Tara matched the shadow’s pace as she decided what to say.

“M. Grimwald,” she said. “I have a few questions, if you don’t mind.”

The shadow’s head inclined. The disk flashed. Was it silver after all?

“I don’t expect you have full knowledge of your, ah, firm’s operations. But I believe you recently supplied a shipment of indentured laborers for delivery to Alt Coulumb. You sourced them by early foreclosure on the credit lines of a divine refuge in Agdel Lex. The indenture’s purpose was to smuggle demons into Kos’s city—but the persons smuggled were instrumental in disrupting the smuggler’s plans. Which is a bit neat, if you ask me. Almost as if the person Ramp approached for help meant her to fail.”

The shadow’s footsteps sounded exactly as heavy as a normal person’s. An odd patina marred the surface of the coin.

“I’m pretty far out in my speculation,” she said. “Paranoid, even. But it never hurts to say thank you.” They had almost reached the summit. “So, thank you.”

Grimwald turned to her. Within the nothing of its face, its teeth were pure white and sharp. It offered her the coin, and she accepted. The coin was not silver at all, but cool, and rocky, and rough. The shadows on its surface were the same as the shadows on the moon.