Zezili dropped the cups. They clattered loudly. “Shocking,” she said.

“It surprises me very little that you have no friends,” Monshara said, retrieving the overturned cups.

“I just don’t care for games made to part stupid people from their money.”

Monshara put the cups back on the table, upside down. “I suspect your choice was right the first time.” She lifted the center cup again. The silver coin appeared beneath it.

Zezili snorted. She took up the coin and examined it. The writing was Dorinah. “Freedom from tyranny and want,” was written along the edge. The portrait was of a bold-nosed woman with large lips and a noticeable overbite. Her mane of hair was knotted and beribboned in intricate bows.

“Is this your empress?” Zezili asked.

“Was,” Monshara said. “She was killed fourteen years ago. The country was scoured soon after.” She gently took the coin from Zezili’s hand. Her fingers were warm. “You used to like–” she began, and stopped.

Goosebumps rose on Zezili’s arms. Hearing about somebody else with her face still chilled her. “Whoever that person was you knew, she wasn’t me,” Zezili said. “No more than the empress on that coin is mine.”

“I have no illusions,” Monshara said.

Zezili stared at the coin again. “How’s it possible things are so different there compared to here? How did you lose to those slaves?”

“They were never slaves,” Monshara said. “They have always been powerful. We just made different choices over there. Small choices that grew large over time.” She shrugged. “I’m not a philosopher.”

The bar matron brought over Zezili’s three fingers of hard lemon liquor and Monshara’s watered wine.

When the woman left, Zezili asked, “What do you want?”

Monshara played idly with the coin, flipping it across her knuckles like some cheap backstreet conjurer. “Can we not sit and drink together?”

“Considering your people are about to wipe the world of mine? I see no need for us to be friends.”

“My people?” Monshara pocketed the coin. “The Tai Mora are not my people.”

“I think you’ve done a pretty good job of being Tai Mora.” Zezili leaned back in her broad-backed chair.

“I came to you with a warning.”

“From your masters?”

“From me. I know your mother lives in Saolina. I heard you visited her.”

“You heard, did you?” Zezili expected the woman had a number of little birds among Zezili’s women, especially after the business with the gate, but she was as yet uncertain how many.

“I can suspect what you visited her about.”

“Can you?” She took a long swallow of her drink.

“I didn’t survive the end of my people because I was slow,” Monshara said. “No doubt your mother had interesting things to say about how she would build a mirror, maybe even one that could focus Oma’s power. I think you should forget all that.”