Ferant had no quarrel with man or gob. The world itself was enemy enough. It fought him for every crop. Sought to claim his unicorns with disease before he could claim them for his family's bellies. Took away his sons. There were only the three of them now in that lonely house. Him and his wife Osanne and their only surviving daughter Jenefer. The others had all been lost to pestilence or accident or war. The world was no more kind to children than it was to soldiers. Few of either occupation survived for long. With no living sons (save their one boy Willet who ran off, preferring the outlaw's life to the farmer's), all the difficult work fell to Ferant. Though Jenefer was now old enough to lend a hand, and this she often did. Still, her paw was an old-fashioner and preferred his women inside tending to more ladylike things. Babies and cooking and such. It pained Ferant to see Jen's soft hands become calloused and scratched. But she seemed to enjoy the work. Perhaps his ways were too antique. His daughter surely would make a fine heir for this meager little fiefdom and could manage things on her own.

As Ferant filed down the horn on his eldest unicorn, a rowdy male named Deacon that would soon be ready for the supper table, he saw two men strolling down the hill toward his home. They were both clad in black leathers and had weapons in their hands. Crossbows. The bowslingers hadn't the look of bandits. Nor standard Nation soldiers. One of the strangers called out. "This your house?"

"It is," answered Ferant.

"Who's inside?" The speaker had on his face the lingering stains from some kind of warpaint not fully washed away. It resembled a faint but fearsome skull.

"Just my family," said the farmer.

Skullface kept his eyes fixed on Ferant as the other visitor's gaze moved along the house's features. From window to window, corner to roof. The men reached the fence-line. Osanne and Jenefer were now at the door, watching on.

"Well, hello there," said the second stranger to the women. His head was shaved. Gave him the look of a buzzard.

"What can I do for you sirs?" Ferant asked.

"'Bout some water?" said the painted one.

"Certainly," said Ferant. "Osanne, mind filling these mens' canteens?"

"Jus' you three here right now?" asked the bald one as he moved toward the door.

"Please, sirs," said Ferant, standing. Deacon the unicorn snorted and scurried off, glad to be free of the farmer's handling. "I beg you just move on through. We got nothin' of value here."

The bald one looked Jenefer over as he slid through the doorway. "Beg to differ, friend."

The skull-faced one's eyes went to the filing stone Ferant still held in his leathered hand. "You wanna put that down?"

Ferant complied. Dropped the porous rock in the mud. "Look, sirs. I'll happily fill your bellies and your waterskins. But I still got many chores to get to before—"

"Let's take it inside, cowhand," said Skullface but Ferant remained frozen. "C'mon, let's move."

The farmer willed time to stop on its axis but of course it did not. Only groaned on in harsh negligence. Ferant lowered his head and went inside. He expected nothing good and was right.

— • —

Thirteen and Vulture had been sent ahead to scout, as Blacwin was still recovering and not fit for that duty. The pair of jackals now sat with this family of homesteaders at their dinner table as if gathered for a holiday feast. Their unwitting hosts were all pale and silent. They had been short a chair and rather than let them bring in another Thirteen forced the daughter to sit on his lap. She was perhaps twenty years of age. Hardy from life on the frontier but next to what these Reapers had seen of late, she was a perfumed doll.

"Always fancied the idea of finding the right damsel," said Thirteen, "and runnin' through the Hinterlands killin' everythin' in our path. Robbin' and raisin' hell together, jus' me an' her. Ain't that the most romantic thing you ever heard? Wouldn't that be some fun, honey?!"

Jenefer swallowed and looked off. Fought back tears.

"Aw, you jus' ain't sweet on us 'cause you don't know us good yet," said Vulture. "Ask us anythin'. C'mon. We'll answer true."

"What are you doing out here?" asked Ferant.

"Well, that's classified Nation business," said Thirteen.

"You're soldiers, then?" asked his wife Osanne. "Men of honor?"

"Who ever told you the one was the same as the other?" asked Vulture as he gnawed at a bone.

Thirteen rolled back a sleeve and showed them his Reaper tattoo. Scythe and snake. He hissed like a serpent.

Vulture tossed his bone down on his plate. "Why'd you go and show them that, man?" His eyes scanned the terrified family. "Now we're gonna have to kill these nice folk."

Thirteen stood and pulled Jenefer toward an inside door. "Not before dessert." The woman kicked and squirmed in resistance until he took out his Reaper dagger and put it to her neck.

Ferant slid back his chair and stood. Vulture had his sword out and at Osanne's throat before the farmer got a chance to act. "Please," Ferant said. "Take anything in the house. Just leave our girl be. She's all that matters to us. I beg you."

"Take me in her stead," Osanne pleaded. "I may not be as young but I won't fight like she will. Please."

Thirteen snorted. "Sorry miss, but you ain't my taste." He yanked Jenefer away and started for the stairs. "And I don't quite mind when they put up a fight. Like ridin' a wild mare."

"Hold on now!" Vulture said. "Who said you get first action?"

"What do you propose?" said Thirteen. "We flip a damn coin?"

With his free hand Vulture removed something from his pocket and set it on the table in answer. It was a Julian coin, defaced as most other such currency had been since the Diluvians took power. The relief image of the crowned monarch on its surface was scratched and marred. This was partly due to the ubiquitous hatred of the former Moreland dynasty by many in the Nation but the chief reason for this practice was thanks to official Diluvian decree. Establishments and merchants were only permitted under law to accept the old currency if it had first been so besmirched.

"Call it," Vulture said.

Thirteen looked his hostage up and down. "Tails."

"Sirs," said Ferant. "I know you are good men..."

"The best," said Vulture.

"I appeal to your fairer blood," said Ferant. "Have you no mothers, or sisters, or wives or daughters?"

"Have you no shame?!" Osanne lamented. "Have you no hearts?!"

"Shut your mouths or I'm killin' the whole lot of you!" yelled Thirteen. "Tails, I said!"

Vulture snatched his coin back up and flipped it into the air. It struck the table and rattled and spun. When it was done it was the monarch's ruined face that greeted them. "Heads!" Vulture cackled. He got up from his chair, scraping wood.

Thirteen snarled at the loss and shoved Jenefer toward Vulture. Took his place at the table to keep an eye on the weeping parents.

"You hear stories about the Reapers," said Ferant. "What heroes they are. You're supposed to protect people like us."

"Enough tongue-waggin'," Thirteen snarled. "First one talks again is the first one I slit. Let me explain somethin' to you about the world, farmer-man." Muffled sounds came from above. A door slammed. Vulture having his way with that girl. A violent commotion. Ferant broke down at the vile racket, pained at what his child underwent. "If you don't fight in this world," Thirteen philosophized, "you don't deserve to live. Only the strong win. The weak got to die to keep our race strong and pure."

As if to underscore the Reaper's point Osanne decided to fight. She snatched a knife from the table but by the time it was in her hand her neck already gushed hot blood. Thirteen pulled his blade back and the woman's gurgling body thudded to the floorboards. Ferant went to her and held her and wailed to the backdrop of his daughter's continuing assault upstairs. In the span of minutes his world had shattered. Thirteen had not the brain to care. He was a reptile, cold of blood. A fitting and common trait for Reapers. There was no point in keeping the old earth-tiller alive any longer. He stood over the broken man and admixed his blood with that of his wife's.

— • —

Thirteen banged on the upstairs door. Vulture unlocked it and answered. He was cleaning blood from his own dagger with a feminine cloth. Thirteen looked over his shoulder and saw Jenefer's pale body twisted in the bloody sheets. The perfumed doll destroyed.

"Sorry, brother," Vulture said, his eyes wide and distant. "Had to keep her. Make her mine." He was caught in a trance, his lust for both flesh and blood sated, at least for the moment. When he was lost out in the desert Vulture had invented his own religion. His sundrunk mind made idols of bones and shells found in the sand. He began to believe the spirits of those he killed followed him and would serve him in the afterlife. An old idea many ancients had shared, those eaters of the dead.

"Don't fret, friend," Vulture said as he blinked and regained his senses. "Body's still warm to the touch." The Reaper held up his wicked blade. "Even left you a couple extra holes to play with..."

— • —

Skinner bought himself some previously stolen boots from a fence in the Hookyards night market. They were had for a swindle and were made from imported ruffhide which would handle the long muddy walks well. The back-alley bazaar shifted venues on each night and only those versed in the underground cant and the signs in the graffiti had any hope of discerning its location. Even the slang and codes themselves had changed somewhat during Skinner's time in the pen, making the job a riddle that challenged his intellect which had atrophied along with his body in that cell. It felt good to work both again.

Skinner's new mudpipes carried him to the dockyards where he saw the great ships with their sails and masts disappearing into the low fog like cloaked magi hung at stakes for the burning. Birds of the sea sailed among the high posts and perched on their beams and called bleakly into the deaf heavens. The repeater saw foreigners in strange dress and custom, visitors from strange lands. He glimpsed a rakshasa though a merchant-wagon window that exited the wide cargo doors of a warehouse, bound for some other part of the city. The palanquin was clearly of rich make and was surrounded by a throng of human guardsmen. The face Skinner saw through that tiny opening was almost feline, with catlike ochre eyes and thin expressionless features. The djinn were a rare sighting. Neither the Diluvians nor the People trusted them. Their ways were strange and it was rumored they freely used sorcery in their cities but they of course denied breaking the Covenant they themselves drafted and enforced. Few humans ever saw djinn lands. And yet here they were doing business in Camshire and busying themselves with the Triad's affairs. It was small wonder they were so distrusted and feared, so much so that they had to travel under secrecy and protection. Many even wore ornate masks as some strange symbol of their status, shrouding them in deeper mystery and further damning them in the eyes of the xenophobic masses. Skinner had seen pamphlets claiming to be the djinns' master plans to take over the world through manipulation and coin and influence. But Skinner also knew written words lied as well as lips. Maybe better. For all he knew, average humans only ever saw those djinn who had enough wealth to make the journey here to trade and politic in Camshire. Perhaps the rakshasa too had entire slums of poor on the other side of that great and angry sea.

Skinner asked around the Hookyards, polling longshoremen and sailors and foremen and laborers about the missing boy Jarid and soon came to learn that the urchin was known to haunt the local roach-infested inns and hostels in his spare hours to seek the company of sailors and merchants. "Don't know what that boy did with them men," one dockmaster said, "but I got my suspections."

"Don't listen to them gutterskunks," said another, the tutmouthed owner of one of the bunkhouses Skinner had been directed to. "Jarid came here to hear the sailors' stories of other lands. Boy was fascinated by their accounts of foreigners and their ways. If I were a bettin' man, I'd guess he finally heard enough tales of the sea and decided to go see it all for himself. Talked a crew into hiring him to swab their decks, maybe. Or stowed away in some cargo hold. Runt had the grit an' spit for it. If so, good on him. Woulda been sent off to war, anyway. Whole country's goin' to the swamps."

Skinner carried his investigation to Ashe and Broodwich and stood under street lamps that crawled with phosphorous bugs. When he was a kid these streets were lit with nothing but torches and oil lanterns. Things changed so fast. He knocked on doors and got no answers though he could hear sounds of life inside. It was evidently a wise place to snatch a kid, if such was your dark desire—for there were many minnows to prey on in these tenements yet somehow never any witnesses. But Skinner understood the burghers' indifference. He wouldn't answer for a stranger in these unsafe wards either. It could always be Father Death at the door. Or worse, a Diluvian Inquisitor.

Skinner finally got a couple people to spout something useful and learned that the witnesses to Georgene's abduction were two homeless boys who lurked these streets. He sought the kids out and finally found them huddled in a weedy lot. They were picking through a pile of junk they'd poured onto the ground and had spread out with sticks. The older boy carried a long pole with a grimy net at its end and the younger held a lantern full of wisp bugs that flitted in the pale light. Skinner bought the pair of urchin boys milk and meat pies and toffee from a sodden vendor and sat with them on a stoop where they told him what they knew of Georgene before she vanished from the world. The loose pack of children here mostly lived on and under the streets. There were always the orphanages to appeal to but they couldn't stand their crowded halls and strict ways where abuse was often even more certain to come than out in this urban wilderness. Skinner knew this himself all too well and had the old scars to prove it.

The boys recounted shore-hunting with Georgene down in the sewers below. Skinner had done the same as a street rat himself. Long ago, he was them, sang the same song, looking for treasures in the tunnels dropped by those who walked over the dripping grates above. They had dreams of scoring some precious jewel or an arcane fetish or a marvelous timepiece but in reality the tunnels usually offered nothing better for their pockets than the occasional silver coin. Still, that was nothing to scoff at and made for a glorious day. Picking through the shit and slime and shooing rats with torches and lanterns and clearing away curtains of webs, Skinner had cut his skills in the same manner as a boy. Always beneath the boots of other men.

"Can you tell me what the snatcher looked like?" Skinner asked.

"It was the Banshee," said the younger boy. The older snorted. An unbeliever.

"The Banshee," Skinner repeated. He'd forgotten the old legend of a Gallowshade woman who'd murdered herself and her children only to rise as a cold and restless spirit cursed to forever carry on her wicked compulsion to take the lives of the young. Obviously a tale meant to scare the kiddies into doing as they were told, no truer than the Alms Fairy or Hitchens the Dancing Goat, but Skinner suspected the story of the loathsome woman had been inspired by some tragically true seed. As most legends were. "What did she look like, exactly?"

"Wore a gray cloak," said the elder boy. "We couldn't see her face. Or we did, but... we lost it. All I remember now is a blur. Tryin' to think of it hurts, even."

Skinner asked if there was any other place Georgene spent her time. The boys said she had lived under Beggar Bridge before they met her, but she had come here to escape the temptations and soul-crushing angst that festered in that awful underpass. Yet another landmark of this mad city that Skinner knew all too well. This had indeed become a walk down a tunnel of bad memories and tainted nostalgia for the man.

Skinner thanked the boys and gave them each a copper and moved on with his macabre quest. A rowdy bunch of teens and men poured out from the door of a fraternal den as he passed by. An agitated tribe full of dangerous energy and ill intentions and volatile with booze. They roughed each other up and slapped the backs of their packmates' skulls and squirmed to escape headlock ambushes. Skinner put up his hood and passed them with his eyes down to the ground. He felt their gazes on him and detected a subtle shift in their attention as their minds calculated whether this passerby was worth antagonizing. Theirs was another walk that the seasoned rogue was familiar with. After falling out with the Reapers, Skinner had fallen in with the Hellhounds—but his tenure was short-lived, for not long after his initiation the entire gang was nearly massacred in a single midnight skirmish with the Gorgon Boys. Skinner managed to escape the fray of knives and pipes and chains those many years ago with some vicious cuts and a dislocated shoulder and newfound wisdoms. He was better off a loner, he learned, and fights were for other men.

— • —