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Marasi stops at the threshold of an unassuming row townhome on Thirty-Third and Finete — one of the Bilming developer's mass-produced units in Knightbridge, each painted a different colour and fronted by a different tree to gesture at individuality without paying for it. The hesitation is religious: this is allegedly the Survivor's safehouse, and as a Pathian raised on tales of Kelsier she is about to meet a man she prayed to as a child. *You've chatted with Death*, she tells herself; her nerves answer that *yes*, this is different.

Moonlight touches a piece of metal on the door — *identity lock*, she notes — and the bolt clicks open. Inside, a polished, undecorated foyer; off the left, a curtained room where the walls are lined with maps under electric lamps and a plump young woman with a stark blonde bob sits with a small terrier in her lap, frowning at a paper full of script Marasi cannot read. *Travel to Bjendal has been completely upset*, the young woman is mid-rant — four primary systems, counting Roshar, no longer safely reachable, the perpendicularities increasingly unviable for any kind of mass commerce despite what the Nalthians keep trying to make work. Then she notices Marasi. *You brought a local!*

Moonlight introduces her as Codenames — *Codenames Are Stupid, long story* — and asks after TwinSoul; mathematics are needed. While Codenames goes to fetch him, Marasi catches her bearings on the maps. One is of Scadrial — more detailed than any official survey, including the dark and unexplored parts of the south. The others are of other worlds. *Rusts*, she thinks. *How many worlds are out there?* — and remembers the Survivor's catechism: *there's always another secret*.

Codenames returns with an elderly man — deep tan, long powder-white mustaches, short beard, formal Bilming suit, gripping the doorframe for balance but standing tall. *A guest! Welcome to our home, honoured guest.* Despite Moonlight's noting their deadline, TwinSoul insists on bringing her tea before any business; Marasi accepts a cup of mint with lemon and a plate of nuts and feels guilty letting a man so old wait on her, until she recognises her aunt's brand of stubborn hospitality and stops arguing.

Then he comes to the rubbings. As he leans over the table, Marasi sees what she had missed: a thin line of pinkish-red crystal traces the outsides of his fingers and wrists like a glove seam, climbs from his collar to his temples like rivers, and *expands* — growing out from his temples into a pair of crystal spectacles, then a second smaller pair before the first for extra magnification. *How…* she begins. He apologises — this is not lightly shared with an outsider, even an honoured guest, and he will not explain without his leader's leave. Moonlight, lounging by the bookshelf, asks him to anyway: it is an emergency. Marasi realises that Moonlight is not as anxious about her presence as she had been pretending; she is enjoying showing this off.

As TwinSoul works, the crystal does whatever he needs: a pen nib grows on his finger and he writes; a cup grows out and he drinks from it before letting it crumble to powder and vanish; a knife blade forms and he cuts a section out of the rubbing; a frame and pole grow up to hold the cutout for inspection; he settles into a chair he has just made for himself. *Silajana says he would be happy to aid in this*, he tells Moonlight, speaking for the crystal in the first person. Moonlight explains to Marasi: *it's called an aether — an ancient entity predating the creation of your world. Would you like to know more?* *Yes*, Marasi whispers. *And you shall. Once you join us.*

Then TwinSoul crosses to the round table at the centre of the room with a full cup, rests his hand on it — and a crystal city grows out from the contact point like frost forming on steel. Buildings, troughs of streets, the circular tracks of the partly-finished high-speed rail growing in last of all: a complete model of Bilming in roseite. He marks three candidate locations in deeper red. The first is Independence Tower — the central spire — long known as a hub for the agents of Autonomy and almost certainly an entrance to the caverns, but a fortification whose security has so far been beyond even the Survivor's arts, in part because it can spot ghosts. The second is the Dulouis Building, a smaller office at the perimeter of one of the blast zones and a Set hotbed; his preferred guess. The third he gives less weight: an old tire factory on the city's outer ring beneath a stretch of train track.

*Tires?* Moonlight says. *Like where Tobal Copper worked?* Marasi asks if it is owned by Basin Tires; it is. Codenames pulls the surveillance file: their watcher has noted that the factory is mostly shut down — very little is ever shipped out. But — Marasi presses — does it get an *unusual* number of deliveries given how little it makes? Yes. Moonlight meets her eyes: those aren't supplies for the factory, they're food and arms stockpiles for the cavern underneath. The strike point chooses itself: less guarded than the spire, the rail to it is built and running, and they can be there quickly.

TwinSoul sobers and asks how urgent the threat is. They tell him: the delivery device, the harmonium–trellium bomb, the blinded god, weeks of Autonomy breathing down the Set's neck demanding results, the high probability that the launch could come at any time. He whispers — *by the first aether* — and looks at Codenames, whose eyes have gone wide. *Moonlight*, he says, *we should contact the master.* She hates the delay, but agrees. *Codenames, is your special friend nearby?* Upstairs. She runs to fetch him. *The master?* Marasi asks. *Yes*, Moonlight says. *It's time to talk to Kelsier.*