She pressed her fingers into the sand, past the warm top layer, into the damp cool beneath. The beetle marched past, and saluted her with its mandibles. She flicked it, and it hissed at her. “You know Jace sent me away from the mountain.”

“You may have mentioned it a few hundred times or so when you were drinking.”

“He wanted to appease some clients who are suing us because their idol died. They don’t have a chance—but they keep prying anyway. I think they’re looking for something.”

“Like what?”

She heaped the sand beside her into a fortress, and carved a moat around its walls. “The idol that died was tied to a lot of others. If the Craftswoman gets those records, she might be able to learn about our other clients—who they are, how they spend their souls. And if that happens, we could all be in trouble.”

“Is that possible?”

“Maybe.”

“So tell your boss.”

“Who will call me obsessed and maybe he’s right. I might be making things up to compensate for being reassigned. Seeing conspiracies everywhere. I don’t want to be the girl who cried kraken.”

He adjusted his grip on the club, and held it out to her. “Are my V’s pointing in the right direction?”

“I don’t even know what that means.”

“Just say yes or no. You have a fifty-fifty shot at being right. Better than most coaches in my experience.”

“No.”

“That’s what I thought.” He shifted his hands, and turned back to the artificial green.

She demolished the fortress she’d built, and filled the moat with its sand. “I should trust Jace to deal with this.”

The club rose without tremor or hesitation. The old man’s body was a perfect line. Then the club fell.

A sharp clean crack echoed across the beach and back again. The ball flew out, and up, and straight, until it disappeared into the sunset-singed sky. Mako nodded. “That look as good as it felt?”

“Yes.”

He fished for another ball. “Find what’s wrong with the foundation, then fix it.”

“You think I won’t be able to move forward until I settle this question.”

“I was talking about my swing,” he said, fishing for another ball. “But why not?”

She stood, slapped sand off her skirt, and leveled her fortress’s ruins with her shoe. “Guess I better get to work.”

“What’s your plan?” Mako asked.

No one remained to answer him. He shrugged, raised his club, and swung again, missing.

Chapter 21

21

That evening Izza crept to the Godsdistrikt, where she panhandled for scraps of soul and watched an itinerant players’ opera. The performers were boat people, island-hoppers of the Archipelago, who lashed watertight barrels of props and costumes to the outriggers of their canoes. They sang while they paddled. Their proud voices rang out over the ocean as they approached on the morning tide.