David smiled gratefully and handed the reins over before hurrying after the other three. He was a little surprised when they sat down and Mr. Higgins didn’t even complain about the fact that the rough seats were all wet.

“I’m glad to see you all,” Greg said, when he had his plate in front of him again, picking at a piece of bread. “But, uh, what exactly are you doing here?”

“I guess you don’t get much news out here, huh?” Mr. Higgins asked back. “Did you see the pamphlet David wrote?”

“What?” Greg asked. “David wrote a – no way!”

“Don’t look so shocked,” David said, grinning. “It was on werewolves, and not exactly an epic.”

Thoko giggled at Greg’s face. “Did you bring one?” she asked. “Can we see?”

“No, I didn’t bring one,” David said. “You all know everything that’s on there, anyway. I reckon most people around here do by now.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Thoko said. “Not after what’s been going on here.”

One of her hands was touching Greg’s arm, and neither of them seemed to notice. Mr. Higgins clearly did, because he eyed Thoko with new interest, and after a second, took off his hat: “I don’t think we’ve had the pleasure?” he asked. “I’m Mr. Higgins.”

“I figured,” Thoko said, smiling. “Greg talks a lot about you. I’m Thoko Banda, we’ve been working together ever since Greg joined the railway.”

“I’m very pleased to meet you,” Mr. Higgins said. “I did not realize that there were women working as navvies?”

Thoko’s smile grew a little tired. “I’m the only one, so far,” she said. “I think people round here just got used to me by now.”

“What has been going on here?” David asked. “What happened to Greg? You said something about new werewolves?”

“Yeah,” Thoko said. “The company sent six of them to protect this settlement, all of them bitten less than a year ago. When we arrived, they did tell us that two of them were convicts who had only gone through one full moon.”

David groaned. “Idiots.”

“Pretty much,” Thoko agreed. “Well, what they didn’t tell us was that the others were just as young. Only one of them will go through his sixth full moon tonight.”

“So Greg was guarding the whole camp mostly on his own?” David asked.

“Oh, no,” Thoko said. “There’s Bernadette, she’s more than ten years old, with her pack. Boris and Fleur. Fleur’s about two, Boris I never asked. But older than Fleur.”

“About six,” Greg said.

Thoko nodded. “Well, anyway. Nathan told me last night that somehow, Bernadette noticed that things were going haywire with at least four of the new werewolves, back around half-moon, but she got it into her head that maybe she could stop the process. Cause apparently, they were still sort of listening to her orders? I don’t know, I didn’t talk to her.”

“I take it that it didn’t work?”

“They started attacking her yesterday,” Greg grumbled, then blinked. “Was it just yesterday? Feels longer.”

“Yesterday was the fight,” Thoko said. “I don’t know when they started attacking.”

“Right. Must have been sometime in the morning,” Greg said. “So Bernadette came to warn me. I was out with the workers at the building site. They continued the work till afternoon, left a little early, and the four of us escorted them back. That’s when they came at us, while we secured the workmen’s formation.”

“So it was four against four?” David asked. “And they still made such a mess of you?”

“No.” Greg shook himself. “It was Nathan and I against three of them. The last one picked the other flank. Of the trail, I mean. He ran off when he saw Boris.”

“Nathan went after him this morning,” Thoko added. “I don’t know if he’ll catch up though. Right around the camp, there’s no more Rot, but we don’t know how big the secure area is.”

“Great,” David sighed.

“Are you going to go after him?” Thoko asked.

“Have to, don’t I?” David said. “Lane wanted to talk to someone official. I guess we’ll leave as soon as she’s back.”

“You don’t think Nathan can handle one werewolf on his own?” Thoko asked.

David shrugged. “Hunting alone is never a good idea. There’s a reason why Lane is so famous for surviving it this long. And Nathan, well. He would be a great hunter if he wasn’t reckless to a fault.”

“I still don’t understand what you’re all doing here,” Greg said quietly. “Isn’t that – isn’t that the duke over there?”

David glanced over towards the camp’s gates. Sure enough, George Louis had just entered with the man in the rumpled suit.

“Looks like Brown is giving him the tour,” Thoko said. She was glaring at the pair of them.

“Brown is the guy who looks like he slept in his suit?” David asked.

“Yes. He always looks like that,” Greg added. “What’s the duke doing here?”

“I don’t know, either,” David said. “He said something about inspecting the progress himself. I reckon he’ll want to see your building site, too. Probably with Lane and me as guards.”

“Since when is it ‘Lane’ anyway, and not deLande?” Greg asked.

“Since we’re officially courting, I suppose,” David said.

The look on Greg’s face was pure gold, he had to admit.

“What?” his little brother managed after a few seconds. “You’re kidding, right?”

“I actually had to earn the privilege,” David grinned. “I promise I’ll tell you the details later,” he added because Greg continued to stare at him. When David glanced sideways to Mr. Higgins, Greg nodded slowly.

“You better,” he grumbled. “But there she is,” he added. “With Captain Reed, great.”

The man at Lane’s side, wearing a uniform much like the guards’, was already walking towards George Louis and the one Thoko had called Mr. Brown. His salute would have made any drill sergeant proud.

“You don’t seem overly fond of him,” David noted.

“He had been warned about the four behaving oddly and didn’t think to inform anyone but his own men,” Greg grumbled. “Not even Nathan.”

“I see,” David said. “Looks like we showed up just after all the fun is over. Lane and I’ll speak to him about the matter, once we’re back,” he added. “Maybe he’ll listen to a countess, even if he doesn’t listen to common sense.”

The captain wouldn’t be the first person he came across in recent months to react that way.

They watched in silence how the captain talked to the duke. David got the impression that he was just as surprised about George Louis’s presence as everyone else.

“So – uh, why are you here?” Greg asked, looking at Mr. Higgins.

“I wanted to come and see how you were doing, of course,” said Mr. Higgins. “David contacted me about the situation, because I know someone with a printing press, and told me, well, pretty much everything that’s been going on. And when Prof. Audenne – you’ll meet him shortly, I’m sure – decided he wanted to do a field trip out here to study how the Rot reacts to werewolves, well, I just invited myself along.”

“And the Church doesn’t stop them?” Greg asked.

“You really aren’t up to date around here, are you?” Mr. Higgins asked, grinning, and then launched straight into a description of everything that had happened in the capital after the fight between the Morgulon, Fenn, and d’Evier’s Rot-creature. David listened with only one ear, keeping an eye on deLande and George Louis.

It was probably a little narcissistic, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that George Louis was only out here today because he was, too.

“Please excuse me,” he said, as soon as Lane walked a few steps away from the group, and went over to join her.

“The captain of the garrison didn’t have much to add to what we already heard, but we can go after Nathan right now,” Lane reported.

David nodded. “Let’s go,” he said. He stopped at Greg’s table, to let his brother know they were leaving again, and to promise that they would have time to talk once they were back.