There should not have been a problem. Oblique’s missive had stated explicitly that the only danger was the magician and her bodyguard, and after Kitten Puke’s use of thematic constructs in a hermetic bubble they were both out of action.
A fictionsphere, she remembered suddenly. That was what they had called the impossible hotel Kitten Puke had dreamt into being.
The term resonated, a combination of words she was sure she should recognise.
Gilead waved the smoke away angrily, gesturing at her with a nod of the head and then looking directly towards the door as he reached down to the holster on his belt and drew forth a glimmering golden Walther PPK engraved with four complex Chinese characters.
Fengshen Bang—the Investiture of the Gods—Gilead’s weapon was well known in the circles she m
