Talia doesn't start talking right away. She takes a slow drink from a coffee she didn't buy for herself, glances around the floor to check who's close enough to listen, then finally speaks in a voice pitched low enough that I have to lean in.
"Casimir Voss sits on Vantage's board now," she says. "Has for the last six years. Before that, he ran contract design for the entire company. Every major lifespan clause template still in use today, including the ones you found in the archive, traces back to structures he built."
"So he's the same hand behind the pattern."
"He's the hand behind almost everything on this floor, whether people realize it or not." She sets the coffee down. "I worked under him. Fourteen years ago, back when I was still climbing tiers, back when I thought being good at
