She had gone to her grandmere first thing that morning. The old woman was better in the mornings. She had recognised Carmen – even called her by name. Carmen had held one of Grandmere's hands in her own, inwardly recoiling at the waxy feel of her skin and the knobbliness of her swollen knuckles, and remarked positively on Grandmere's latest painting – a chaotic swirl of reds and yellows and browns like a galaxy tearing itself apart. Then she had asked her about the dice. She had not expected Grandmere to remember them, let alone what had become of them, but she had underestimated the old woman.

"Oh I gave them away," Grandmere said.

"To who?"

"I - I don't remember," she said, her face pinching up.

Concerned she might begin to cry, Carmen hadn't pressed her.

She had gone to Flag Wood around midday to meet with Ward, and had told him all she had learned. He was as perplexed as she was. With Corvus away, he suggested asking Snapper about the dice.

"Can we trust him?" Carmen said.

"It's not like he can take the dice off me – off us. I don't have them. We're just going to ask out of interest, right?"

"That's all we did with the Oliphant too."

"That was different," Ward said, unable to keep the note of irritation out of his voice. "The dice are mine. Won't seem suspicious that I want them back, will it? If someone had taken something of yours, wouldn't you want it back?"

"I guess," Carmen said, but wasn't convinced by his logic. The Brotherhood weren't known for making fine distinctions. In any case, she had no option but to go with him to Snapper's. He would have gone without her anyway.

"The art of angling," Snapper announced, "requires deep concentration, and deep silence." He reached down and pinched the line between his fingers and nodded to himself, as if the fishes' very thoughts were being transmitted through the line to his fingertips.

"That's the problem with blokes," Mildew said. "Can't do two things at the same time. Fish and chat, for example."

"Nonsense," Snapper said.

"It's a natural fact. Got any more of that pie?"

"Pie? Oh yes. Help yourself."

"I can do more than one thing at once," Ward said.

"Walk and breathe perhaps," Mildew said into the creel, through which she was rummaging. "I gotta say Mr. Snapper, that's one fine pie."

"Family recipe. Snappers have been making apple pie for centuries. We start with only the choicest, ripest fruit -"

"Aren't you meant to be concentrating?" Carmen said.

"Oh," Snapper said, and turned away to pinch the line again.

"How do you like them apples?" Slops said, apropos of nothing, and to the great confusion of all present.

The afternoon stretched out deliciously. A fine mist rose off the river, golden under the sun. Birds sounded all around them: raucous stooks, thoughtful-sounding ducks, squeaking finches. Far-off pipings and bell-like cadences chimed from nearby Xandra Wood.

After the same stook had caught three fish to Snapper's none, he decided that the bird was the problem, and encouraged Mildew to skip her stones at it, a task she gleefully undertook. The bird, full of fish anyway, rose heavily into the air and flew out of Mildew's range.

Carmen had sensed Ward's impatience growing as they watched Snapper fish. A couple of times he had looked at her with raised eyebrows, as if to say well? She ignored him. You want to know, you ask him, she thought.

"We wanted to ask you something," Ward said, finally.

Snapper turned the handle of his fishing reel slowly until the line tightened, pretending that he hadn't heard anything.

"About an artifact," Ward said.

The hand stopped winding.

"We think it's in the Arcane Vault," Carmen said.

"Do you now?"

"Well we don't know for sure. See, we don't even know if the Arcane Vault exists."

"Oh it exists."

"Where is it?" Ward said.

We start with only the ripest, choicest fruit. Then we throw it at people we don't like.