I blinked against the glaringly bright light streaming in through the stained-glass windows of the chapel.

Arturo was waiting for me, looking haggard and worn out. He wasn’t the only one hanging around for my arrival. The orange tabby from the night before was sitting in a pool of sunlight, flicking his tail and purring contentedly. Lounging on the cat’s side, hands laced behind his tiny head, was Renholm. Cal was nowhere to be seen, but that wasn’t entirely surprising since Arturo had probably reestablished the chapel’s wards to keep the Elder Changeling from busting in.

“Thank the gods above you’re alive,” Arturo said, sounding deeply relieved.

“I told you he was fine,” Renholm trilled, not bothering to even sit up. “I would’ve felt it had our Pact been dissolved by his untimely demise.” He sniffed dismissively. “And then I would’ve hunted his spirit down as it crossed between the veil and tortured it mercilessly for welshing on our deal.”

“Good to see you too, Renholm,” I said.

“So, this monstrous little devil really is with you, then?” Arturo said, glowering at Renholm and me in turn. “I didn’t want to believe it. In all my years upon this earth, I have never wanted to smite a creature more, but after I accidentally banished your spirit guide, I didn’t want to make another mistake. Still, I find it hard to believe that you, a noble Vigil and divine warrior called from across the stars, would debase yourself by partnering with this… this vile miscreant.”

I shrugged. “Eh, what can I say? Turns out monster hunting makes strange bedfellows. He’s the worst, but he’s also useful.” I paused. “When directed.”

Renholm, glowing with smug satisfaction, stuck out his tongue at the priest.

“What’s the deal with the cat?” I asked, crouching down and pss-pss-pssing at the feline. The big cat blinked at me with knowing eyes and ignored my summons completely. An utter asshole just like all cats.

“A king ought to have a fierce steed,” the pixie replied, sitting up and running a tiny hand through the cat’s dirty fur, “and this noble beast proved himself in battle. I have dubbed him Sir Jacob-Francis. We made a valiant team. Truly, we are the heroes of the day. We drove that monstrous creature off single-handedly and with absolutely no assistance from anyone else.”

“You definitely contributed,” I said, “but drive it off single-handedly and with absolutely no assistance from anyone else? I’m gonna be generous and say you’re misremembering things.”

“Why are we prattling on about the cat?” Arturo growled, running a hand through frazzled hair. “We have more important things to discuss. Like what in the name of all the slithering beasts of the pit were you thinking last night? Charging off like that.”

“I was doing what I’ve been called here to do,” I replied. I’d been dressed down by tougher men than Arturo. A few harsh words from the priest weren’t gonna make me squirm. “Or is hunting shithead monsters and helping people not what Vigils are supposed to do? Maybe I missed the part in the Handbook of the Vigilant where it told me to tuck my tail between my legs and hide in a church while helpless townsfolk get slaughtered.”

“You weren’t ready,” Arturo snapped. “You had no business going toe to toe with something as powerful as an Elder Changeling, and if not for sheer dumb luck, you would be dead now. Justice is your calling and you can’t perform that calling if you blunder off like a headstrong young knight and get yourself killed. Much as you might not like to think so, your life is far more valuable than the life of any one man, woman, or child in Ironmoor—even mine.”

“Not mine,” Renholm chirped. “I’m his liege. He’s duty sworn to die for me.”

“Not true and also unhelpful,” I said, shooting the pixie a look. Then, to the padre, “I disagree. A life is a life and they all matter. I’m here because I jumped on a grenade and saved my buddies from getting blown into the next world. I did that because their lives were as important as my own. Maybe what I did last night was rash, but we have a saying where I come from. ‘The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.’ I’d rather do something rash, Padre, than twiddle my thumbs and do nothing at all. Now, instead of bitching at me, how about we figure out how to stop that thing from killing again?”

Arturo grunted and had the good grace to look away. He cleared his throat and straightened his rumpled cassock. “You’re right, of course, honored Vigil,” he replied with a sigh. “Please forgive me. I fear this is a moral failing of my own, not yours. Before I became an Arbitrator I was… something else. A knight, I suppose you could say.” He looked like he was on the verge of saying more, but instead he waved a hand through the air. It isn’t important.

I suspected it was very important.

Arturo wasn’t a compulsive drunk for no reason. He was running from something traumatic, and as a gambling man I’d bet double or nothing that some mission had gone sideways and it had probably happened under his command. But I could also see the pain and hesitation etched into the lines of his face. This was a festering wound, and I knew from ample experience that he wouldn’t appreciate me poking at it. When he was ready to share, he would. That was how these sorta things went.

“Apology accepted,” I said. “Now we need to get our asses moving. My stomach is about to eat itself, so I think we should hit up the inn first, then go take a look at the crime scene. See if we can’t sniff out any clues. Then we make a plan. In my experience, there ain’t nothing that can’t be killed with enough foresight and firepower.”

Arturo took a few minutes to compose himself, forgoing his usual cassock for a shirt of heavy silver scale mail that flowed down over his thighs, covered by a black tabard with the golden sword-shaped symbol for Justice emblazoned on the chest. It was the same symbol branded onto my forehead. He’d donned heavy leather boots, the shins cover in plate steel, and wore a matching set of bracers accompanied by thick leather gloves. A black cloak with a deep cowl, edged in fur, trailed down his back. A short, practical dagger rode one hip while he carried his heavy war staff.

Arturo looked less like a priest and more like a solider riding to war. I was glad he was on my side.

“You look fat, but fierce,” Renholm noted in approval. “Just remember to keep your cold iron well away from me, I cannot abide its touch.”

“Then try holding your tongue so I’m not tempted to cut it out, you wretched little fiend,” the padre replied, glowering at the pixie, who was now perched on the cat’s back.

“So glad to see we’re all getting along,” I muttered, pulling open the chapel doors. “Try to play nice, huh?”

I headed onto the street but froze when I saw a milling crowd of dirty and unwashed faces waiting for something. Their eyes locked on me, and I could see fervent zeal ignite in their faces. They weren’t waiting for something, they were waiting for someone. For me. More than a few doffed their caps, while the women dropped in deep curtsies, grinning at me like I was a fairy-tale knight instead of just some dude who’d gotten his ass handed to him on a silver platter.

The requests started flowing in, first in a sputter then in a rush.

“Please, Vigil, pray for my crops!” someone shouted from the back.

“A blessing on my household,” came another.

“My wife is grievously ill.”

“Vigil! Vigil!” a woman cried, shouldering her way through the crowd, pushing a little boy in front of her. “Please bless my child.” She pushed her towheaded son toward me. The kid couldn’t have been more than four or five, but he stumbled forward and bowed his head.

“Should’ve expected them to come out of the woodwork after last night’s spectacle,” Arturo mumbled, sidling up next to me. “Never fear. I’ll get this taken care of.” He stepped between me and the boy and grabbed my hand. “In blessing this child”—he laid my hand on the kid’s head—“the Vigil blesses us all. The divine faces of Raguel shine down on us from the heavens.” From between pursed lips he hissed under his breath, “Say you bless the child already.”

Running off to fight a monster was one thing, but offering some kind of priestly benediction was about as outside of my wheelhouse as things got. But everyone was looking at me expectantly. Hopefully. Including Arturo.

I cleared my throat and channeled Pastor Jeffers, from Grace Covenant. “Lord, bless this child,” I said. “May he grow to be a man of valor and honor his family with his courage.” I’d heard more than a few battalion COs spout that kind of bullshit before deployments and it always seemed to get the troops fired up. “Eh, amen,” I finished awkwardly, pulling my hand away.

The kid raced back to his mother and buried his face in her skirts.

“We are double blessed in the Vigil’s presence and his power.” Arturo was shouting so the people in the back didn’t miss anything.

There were murmurs of agreement. Had to hand it to the padre, he knew how to work a crowd.

“Last night, the Elder Changeling that has been stalking our streets struck once more, and though we suffered the loss of one of our own, the creature did not feast without reprisal. Without fear of his own safety, the Vigil met the monster and matched it blow for blow, making the creature pay in blood for the deaths it has caused. The Changeling, knowing its doom was imminent, fled before the might of the Vigil and the divine wrath of Raguel—knowing that to stay was to die. Though the creature yet lives, it won’t do so for long.” He glanced at me, fierce pride radiating off him in waves. “The Vigil has the beast’s scent and it is only a matter of time before justice is served for the fallen.”

Hot damn. Now that was a speech. It wasn’t even remotely true, but it was a helluva good spin. I’d gotten my ass kicked and my spine broken and even I was feeling more optimistic about squaring up for round two.

“But now,” Arturo continued, “I must ask you to leave the Vigil in peace. We are on a mission and in order to find and vanquish the diabolical creature lingering in the shadows of our fair Ironmoor, he will need to weave magics which are not for mortal eyes.” He waved a hand through the air, wisps of yellow magic trailing from his fingertips. The guy also had a flair for the dramatic. “Know that your well-wishes accompany us on the task. If you feel truly compelled to help, you may always make offerings to the church from the goodness of your hearts—the funds will be used to aid the families of those unfortunate few who have died at the creature’s claws.”

It was a crock, but it worked. In thirty seconds the crowd dissipated, melting into homes, shops, and alleyways, leaving the street to us. Had to admit, Arturo may have been a drunk with a checkered background, but it was convenient having him around.

Though a few more people eyed us as we headed over to the Three Chimneys, no one else tried to stop us; it seemed word had spread that we were on the job and not to be disturbed, which was more than fine by me. There was no sign of Maggie behind the bar, which was odd, since she was always behind the bar, but last night had been a chaotic one—maybe she was just sleeping off all the craziness. Arturo and I picked up a simple meal that consisted of a delicious flatbread loaded with grilled meat, gooey cheese, and a spicy curry paste.

We shuffled out of the inn and ate quickly as we headed over to the crime scene.

“I kept it as you left it,” Arturo said as we rounded a corner and came onto the grisly mess, splayed out across the cobblestones. “But we must work fast. It is a requirement that we bury our dead within the day. Minna was beloved of all.” He paused, pain in his eyes. “She will be missed.”

Someone had erected a tent over the victim’s body and encased it in a mosquito net to keep the flies at bay. She was, as Arturo had promised, right where I’d last seen her, flayed and in pieces, chunks of flesh strewn about the alley and her chest cavity emptied of its contents.

I’d never asked her name. Minna, I now knew. I’d add her to the list along with my fallen brothers. I muttered a prayer over her remains. Though I didn’t really know her, she’d seemed like a sweet girl, certainly not someone who deserved a fate like this. Prayers said, I set to work. I didn’t need her body to remain any longer. The images were already etched into my brain and I’d probably be seeing them in nightmares for years to come.

I let Arturo know that they could remove her.

As a gaggle of grim-faced young men lifted her torso and hauled it to a wooden cart, I spotted a tuft of hair on the ground—it had fallen from her hand. Not hers. Not mine. Who else had been in the alley? Had someone tried to stop the attack but then fled after they’d been mauled by the Elder Changeling? I sniffed the hair, just in case it could give me a clue. Cloves. Oranges. An oil I didn’t recognize. I’d smelled it more than once—most recently at the bathhouse, which made sense considering Minna’s occupation. I put the hair into my pouch and continued with my examination.

“This place reeks of Fae magic,” Renholm remarked, holding his nose, his face twisted in a grimace of distaste. His furry mount lazily prowled through the alley, stopping to sniff at a small splatter of blood.

“Aren’t you fae?” I asked, cocking an eyebrow.

“Don’t be gross, you ignorant child,” the pixie replied, dismounting from the creature’s back and touching down on the cobblestones, near the droplets of crimson. “This foul beast and I share as much in common as you and a banana do. It comes from our world, but it is not a creature of the courts.” He crouched and dipped his fingers in the blood, lifting it to his nose. His grimace intensified. “Fae and human.”

“So this confirms it’s an Elder Changeling?” Arturo asked. “They are the unholy progeny of fae and men, after all. Half breeds.”

“I did not say that, no, no, no, I did not,” Renholm tsked, shaking his head. “Changelings may not be of the elevated blood such as myself, but they are still infinitely better than your kind and they are extremely useful to the Courts of Fairy. This blood. Well, it is as queer as that ugly sack of meat there.” He waved dismissively in my direction. “It is human blood but suffused by Fae magic. Not mixed. Almost as though the bloods are cohabitating in one vessel like oil and water. Very odd.”

As the pixie remounted his feline steed, I turned my attention the alley. After the creature had flipped me into the wall and broken my spine, I had a hazy memory of Arturo showing up at the head of a pitchfork-wielding mob and the monster taking off, sprinting down the alley and toward the outer walls. I pushed my way out of the tent and followed its bloody hand- and hoofprints for a quarter mile before they faded to nothing.

Arturo stopped, his shoulders slumped and his eyes downcast. He looked defeated.

For a priest, the man needed to have a little more faith. The blood wasn’t visible to the eye, but it was landing on all my other senses: copper, bile, sweat. The creature had lingered here for a few minutes, why I could not say. The handprints on the wall were bloody on the way up, but then the creature had cleaned itself off on the grass beyond and snuck back inside the city leaving a trail visible only to me. Well, me and Renholm. The pixie wasn’t using his physical senses to follow the trail like I was, but instead insisted that he was employing his Fae Sense to track the beast.

When I asked him what the hell that even meant, he just cackled like I was a moron. “It glimmers, you fool, you clown, you illiterate swine. It is right there, as easy to read as any book. The creature leaves behind a trail of Purpose as wide as a stream.”

Renholm continued to be a small, tyrannical asshole, but having someone confirm my hunches was nice. It let me know that I wasn’t completely crazy.

“It went that way,” I said, gesturing at the barely perceptible hoofprints that sang up at me from the stones. Their music was death and decay, foul pestilence and degradation. He ran like a gorilla, leaning most of his weight on his meaty forepaws, and their song was no less ominous.

We threaded our way through the town, past houses and businesses until the streets grew narrow and decrepit. We were officially entering the run-down, crackhead end of Ironmoor. There were hovels and lean-tos, rather than houses, all occupied by the blind and the lame and the beggars, so common to every city I’d ever visited. Beyond the tunnel of outcasts, the cobbled road gave way to a dirt track that led to a jagged hole in the ground. It was covered with a metal grate, but scratch marks on the rusted steel told me the creature had come this way, slipping into the dark, dank hole before dragging the grate back into place from below.

“Is this a sewer?” I asked, scratching my chin.

Arturo shook his head. “Mine shaft.”

Interesting. “I’m all ears, Padre,” I said, eyeing the grate.

“Ironmoor used to be a mining town.” He’d mentioned mining in passing when we’d seen the line picker on the road. Marcus, I thought his name was. I hadn’t paid it much mind, but suddenly I was starting to think I needed to.

“Used to be?” I asked. “What changed?”

“What always happens to mining towns, eventually,” the priest replied. “The vein ran dry. Twenty years ago, this was, well before my time in Ironmoor, though the locals still talk about it in hushed whispers. The Dark Year, they call it. An ugly story from what I’ve been able to gather—resulted in the death of an immigrant Rjuhella family. The husband hung in the town square. His wife burned at the stake. Accused of being a warlock. Nasty bit of business.

“But even after the mining operation folded, the tunnels remained. No getting rid of those. There’s a whole labyrinth of passages down there, some natural, others not. Whole sections of tunnel carved into the rock below our feet—they wind all through the town and run up into the hills past the curtain wall. Eventually the council closed the shaft entrances to keep desperate men from venturing down there and winding up dead.”

“That’s probably how it’s gaining access,” I said, some of the pieces clicking together in my head like a finely calibrated machine. “You said the mines are abandoned so it’s even possible that thing is hiding out down there, biding its time between attacks.”

“Unlikely,” Arturo said. “That’s not how Elder Changelings operate.”

“Could be I’m wrong, but I’m starting to think maybe this thing isn’t an Elder Changeling after all.” I reached down and pulled the grate out of its housing. It came away like a toy frisbee though I knew it had to weigh a hundred pounds, easy. Those Attribute Points were no joke and definitely did far more than simply alter my appearance. I didn’t just feel stronger, I was stronger. A lot stronger. “In we go,” I said, nodding toward the dark abyss.

“Absolutely not,” Arturo replied, frowning at the hole. “The creature could be down there, and even if it isn’t, there are other Mortka that call those tunnels home. Stone Spiders. Nasty creatures. There’s a reason that grate is in place, and it’s not just to keep the town populace out—it’s to keep those things in.”

“Sorry to break it to you, pal, but my bounty went down there, so that’s where we’re going. You gotta go where the evidence points you.”