“What in the world of living shits was that?” Jack stands up, vigorously rubbing the spot just over his ear where the piece of the barstool had smacked across his head. “Didja see ol’ Wrinkles kickin’ the shit outta me and decide you needed to get in on that action too? Holy hell.”

He looks over to Corva. She’s not paying any attention to him at all. Just staring out the front door. His missing front door. Jack takes a moment to look around the room. The only really clean and clear place is the empty path between where Thegn was standing and the gaping hole at the front of the bar where the door used to be. Everywhere else, well, it’s not even worth the energy of tallying up the damage. His bar is wrecked. There’s no way he’ll be able to fix it without Harris finding out.

At this point, though, that’s not even in the top three things that Jack has to worry about. Maybe not even in the top five. Death is in Bule. That itself brings its own bucket of trouble. There aren’t many stories of what happens when Death comes to town. There’s rarely anyone left alive to tell them. Jack’s and Lyia’s story is one of the few.

Lyia. What if Thegn finds out she’s here and she also survived the mark? Granted, the old coot didn’t seem to be in much of a hurry to finish off Jack. Maybe he’ll overlook Lyia. Jack shakes his head to himself. That’s not something he’s willing to leave to chance. He’s got to let her know. Death may not be here for them, but that doesn’t mean he won’t be back. He could just as easily come after them the way he’s coming after Corva. Especially since Jack used the Touch on him.

Oh shit. The Touch. Corva. She saw him use it. She knows. She must know. He saw it in her eyes. The questions. The confusion. The betrayal. But he hadn’t betrayed her, had he? It’s not like he was there when the Fold took out her town. It’s not like he’d done any of the attacking. He was just a kid back then. She couldn’t hold him responsible for that, could she?

Guilt creeps in on the edges of Jack’s thoughts. He should’ve told her that his people were the Shadowfold the first time she’d brought it up. But how do you do that? How do you share a horrible truth without losing an ally? Without losing a friend?

Friends. Is that what they are? They’ve had their laughs, but the bulk of their interactions had been filled with banter and insults. Or moments of terror when she was literally trying to kill him. Is that something friends do? But just today, she’d stopped herself. She controlled one of her fits and he’d been there to help. And she’d returned to the bar after running off. Returned to face Death when she didn’t have to. They fought Death together. They’d even held their own against him. Granted, Corva did most of the work there. But Jack used the Touch to save her, to save them both. That’s a thing a friend does, right?

Jack’s arm is itchy and tingly under the chembraid. The gear is working, but his head still hurts, and not just from getting banged around. He chokes back a small wave of nausea. Now isn’t the time to get overwhelmed. He turns away from the devastation of his bar and gives Corva his full attention. Jack has got to make sure they’re on the same page. There’s no way they’re getting out of this unless they’re working together.

Of course, there’s the rub. She hasn’t responded at all to anything Jack’s said. She’s still in a trance, staring at the empty entrance through the tossed chairs and shredded tables.

Jack softens the tone in his voice. “We’re okay, you know, me n’ Zeke. Far as I can tell, we ain’t dead.”

Corva slowly turns her head to him, her expression blank, but not in a dazed zombie kind of way. It’s more like the look a person gets when she’s trying to do the math on a split check where no one considered the cost of what they ate or drank.

“Hey! Corva! I’m talking to you. You in there?”

Her eyes snap back to the now. She’s finally looking right at him. But only for a second.

“Oh no! Zeke!” She rushes by Jack and kneels at the small monkey’s side.

Jack lets out a small sigh of relief. She doesn’t hate him. Or, at least, she cares more about Zeke than she does about hating him. “Zeke’s alright. Still breathin’. Don’t seem like he’s ready to wake up just yet. I think Wrinkles put a pretty heavy squeeze on him. Didn’t seem like anything was broken when I checked. Was a bit rushed, though, what with all the shit flying around in my bar.”

“You checked? How did you know how? Stuff like this has happened before?”

“Like this? Shit no. But he’s a little monkey working a merc bar in a gray town. Everyone gets roughed up a bit. I’m surprised, though. Normally he’s more wily. An old geezer like that wouldn’t ever get the drop on ’em.”

Corva keeps staring down at Zeke. “That ‘old geezer’ is Death. There’s no one else in the world like him.”

“You sure about that?” In his mind, Jack winces, regretting the words as they pass his lips.

She looks up at Jack. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

He hesitates. “Nothing. Forget about it.”

She narrows her eyes at him. He knows that look. She’s not letting this go. Any attempt to talk his way out of it will just leave an awkward gap of trust. May as well rip the bandage off all at once.

“Fine. You really wanna know what that’s supposed to mean? You just went head-to-head with the dude who’s supposed to be frickin’ Death. Then you spent a whole damn minute making lovey eyes at his damn rat. And when that rat got up on Wrinkles’s shoulder, the old man’s eyes were all blank like you get when you’re close to Zeke. I got no clue what’s goin’ on, but workin’ a bar has gotten me pretty good at math. I can put two n’ two together.”

Not really. He can do math, of course, but he’s got no idea who Corva might be. But he does know that no one he’s ever heard of has gone up against Death and lived, especially not one-on-one.

Yeah, he and Lyia survived when Death was part of the raid on the Fold. They’ve got the marks to prove it. But that’s all they did. Survived. It’s not like they ever really fought Death directly. Not like Corva just had.

Jack pauses to catch his breath and squat down next to her. He grimaces as he lowers himself. His chest hurts something fierce, and the itch from his new chembraid isn’t helping. Gorm said the painkillers in his mix were a touch on the weak side, considering Jack’s size, but they should still work unless Jack got hurt really badly. Maybe—no. He’s fine. He can’t focus on the pain. There are more important things to concentrate on right now.

Jack makes sure he’s got Corva’s attention, then asks, “So who the hell are you? Do you even know? I don’t.”

She turns away from him. “I don’t know who I am. They seem to know who I was, though. And I guess—I guess it has to be true. Otherwise, how could I fight him and live?” Her body stiffens for a moment before rounding on him, eyes fresh with anger. “But I wasn’t the one who stopped him, was I? Where did you learn the Touch?”

Shit.

He pauses for a moment, realizing something.

“Oh no. We’ve gotta get out of here. The Touch is straight-up soulmancy. The Goats n’ Sheeps track that shit when they’re close. You already said that Goats are on the way. Between me usin’ the Touch and the imbued tech Wrinkles was sporting, Bule’ll be crawlin’ with foot soldiers in no time.”

“They’re already here. Caffiel said the Umbrati are coming straight down from the top of the canyon.”

Jack tilts his head to better see her face. “Who the hell is Caffiel?”

“The rat.” Corva stands up and grabs one of the go-bags, barely giving Jack enough time to process what she’s just said. “Se liga, Jack. I think Zeke’s hurt pretty bad. But we’ve got no time. We gotta go. Is there a doc in town or a vet or something where we can loot some gear to patch him up?”

Jack pushes all his new questions to the side and thinks for a second. A wide smile breaks across his face despite the pain in his ribs. “I got something even better.”