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Most days the two groups would debrief at noon, over lunch for Pouncy’s teaht in the field ot up late Each side presented its data, and each side would feed what the other side had learned back into the next stage of its investigations There was a certain amount of healthy competition between the two sides Also some unhealthy competition

"For fuck’s sake, As hera toasted brown "How is this getting us anywhere? If I have to hear one oThis whole region is just chickenshit! I would kill for sood, spirit, ot to be a few of those things left We’re practically on the Mediterranean!"

Asuette crusts and smears of local jam Her eyes looked hollow She iped out fro limply, airlifted from one jam set you a siren"

"Sirens?" Pouncy brightened up He banged the table with the flat of his hand "Why didn’t you say so! That’s great!"

"They’re not Greek sirens though They’re French They’re half-snake, froon"

"No Gorgons have snakes for hair Except anyway, I don’t think gorgons are real"

"A half-snake woman," Julia said, "would be a lamia"

"She would be," Asmodeus snapped, "if she were in Greece But we’re in France, so she’s a siren"

"All right, but maybe she knows a laotta think all the snake-bodied women have a network--"

"She doesn’t know a lamia" Asmodeus put her head down on the table "God, you have no idea what you’re asking"

"I’ot to widen your search I’m so sick of this cutesy Frenchy-French shit Ever wonder why Clash of the Lutins was never a ! We can fly you to Greece, the o to Greece But you’ve hit a wall here and you’re too stubborn to admit it"

"You don’t know!" As "You don’t understand what I’ on doors like you’re taking a census You have to build up trust I’s haven’t talked to a huer in Asht, Pouncy"

All eyes turned to Julia She could see that Pouncy had expected her to back hiaht her it was that poasn’t a ga way The answer isn’t wider, it’s deeper If we start hopping around the globe cherry-picking h all our tiot Golden fucking Goat cheese"

"Hey now," Failstaff said "That stuff was perfectly edible"

"You’respecific we’ll never find anything But if we focus on soh what’s there, we’re bound to hit so solid to hit"

"So--"

"We don’t need to go to Greece," Julia said "We don’t need to go anywhere All this stuff has to be connected at the roots Everybody cah Provence: the Celts were here, the Royptians had colonies, and so did the Greeks, Pouncy, if you absolutely need the Greeks to get you hard They even had Jews Sure, it all got covered over with Christianity, but the od in all that, there are no gods to be found"