“You,” said the Warden, pointing a gnarled finger at Anji. Anji blinked and looked around. She hadn’t realized she’d been stepping toward the cage. She had to find out what was inside.

The Warden popped another rock sugar between her lips. It clacked against her teeth as she asked, “Have you seen a Dredger, boy?”

Biting her lip, Anji shot her gaze to the cage once more.

The Hawk gripped her arm above the elbow, her fingers digging into Anji’s skin. Anji hissed a breath, white pain shooting through her sore muscle.

“Answer when the Illuminess speaks to you.”

Anji leveled a look at the Illuminess, now stowing the bag of sweets back into her robes. The woman swept a blue-veined hand toward the cage, her lip curling. “Quickly, Alphoronse, the criminal would like to see. A demonstration before we depart?” She jabbed her finger at Anji once more. “You wish to see the fruits of idleness, child? The sequelae born of the earthly disease of delight?”

Still in the Hawk’s grip, Anji staggered toward the cage, into which she was now afforded a clearer view.

The bottom of the enclosure was filled with soiled straw, black and brown and soaking wet. A fresh gust of wind pushed the stench of stale urine into Anji’s face, making her nose crinkle, her eyes water. White-winged snap flies buzzed in lazy circles around the inside of the cage, flitting from the bars to the snout of the creature inside, its eyes yellow and piercing and staring a thousand miles away. Its mouth hung in a rictus snarl, bile and pus and shining saliva coating its thin gray lips, its pale gums where mangled teeth stuck out at awkward angles like broken fence posts.

“Miserable thing,” said Hectate, following Anji’s gaze.

“Where are you taking them?” asked Anji.

“Them? There’s only one, you stupid boy.”

Anji gestured at the cage. “I don’t know what gender they are.”

Hectate sputtered laughter, sugary saliva splatting against the wagon bed’s boards. “As though you looked upon a baker in his shop! You’d so soon grant personhood to such vileness? Better to befriend a Scorphice in its den. And you can thank the One there’s iron between you and the wretch too, else it might have your face for a meal. Wicked, gluttonous, despicable creatures, the lot of them. We’re taking it from town to town, to show the populace the scum slinking under their feet. Folk must see with eyes as yet unknowing the consequence of indulgence, of meddling with the One’s own flora, plumbing the depths where Their Warmth does not shine.” She rapped a knuckle on the cage’s top, and the Dredger flinched, letting out a pitiful snarl.

“Observe,” she said, waving a hand at Alphoronse.