If you already know who
A direct Veil
You name them, buy their token and lock it. They mirror it on the terms you published, or the offer expires and your deposit comes home untouched.
You pay first.
A partners page costs nothing to write. This costs. Both sides buy the other's token and lock it for a term they pick, so if your partner goes to zero, part of your own balance goes with them. That is the point. You cannot fake caring about someone whose failure is now your problem. Each one is a Veil.
If none of that meant anything yet
Say you and another project want to work together.
Normally you both post about it. That costs neither of you anything, which is exactly why nobody believes it, and in three months nobody remembers who actually did the work.
Here, you each go and buy some of the other's token, on the open market, with your own money. Both amounts get locked up for a period you agree between you. Ninety days, say. Neither of you can take it out early without paying for it.
That is the whole thing. There is no clever part.
What changes is that you are now holding their token. If they go quiet, or rug, or simply fail, you lose money. Not reputation. Money. And anyone can check that you were holding, for how long, and what happened.
You cannot fake caring about a project whose failure shows up in your own balance.
Two ways in, one instrument
If you already know who
You name them, buy their token and lock it. They mirror it on the terms you published, or the offer expires and your deposit comes home untouched.
You pay first.
If you do not
You publish what you want and deposit nothing, because until somebody answers there is no counterparty token to buy. Anyone may answer, and answering means they lock your token before you have chosen.
Say how many partners you want. One call can become several agreements, each with its own counterparty and its own clock.
They pay first.
The rule does not change between the two: whoever wants the partnership pays before the other side has agreed to anything. Which is why a call with ten answers is ten projects who each put money down, and why you can take more than one of them.
The terms, set out for both sides
The first party
Buys the second party's token on the open market, and locks it here.
Cannot withdraw it for the agreed term. Not for any reason.
Receives their own purchase back, linearly, never in one block.
Forfeits their bond if they end it early, and is named for it.
The second party
Buys the first party's token on the open market, and locks it here.
Cannot withdraw it for the agreed term. Not for any reason.
Receives their own purchase back, linearly, never in one block.
Forfeits their bond if they end it early, and is named for it.
Every line on one side has its twin on the other, because there is no version of this where the two parties agree to different things. One side alone is not half a Veil. It is nothing at all.
The question everyone asks second
Nothing traps anyone. Either side may end a Veil early, at any moment. The consequence is written into the instrument rather than argued about afterwards.
Most of the design is refusal
Never judges the work
What you agreed lives off-chain; only its hash is stored, so the words can be proven but never rewritten. Either side may flag it delivered. That flag moves no money, and it never has to.
Never swaps anything
Both sides acquire the other's token themselves, on the open market, at whatever price they get. The vault holds; it does not trade.
Never blocks a withdrawal
New Veils can be paused. Claims cannot. There is a test that pauses the contract and then successfully claims, because a promise without a test is a sentence.
Never changes your terms
The bond token and the break split are pinned into a Veil when it is proposed. No later configuration change can reach a live agreement.
Fund your side, and let them decide whether they meant it too.
Not audited, and not deployed to any chain yet. What that means.