Whitman turned, put a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “Listen to me, Flix. What’s done is done. You’re here, alive, back from the dead. Isn’t that what’s important?”

“Okay.” Flix nodded. “I get it.”

No, Whitman thought, because if you did, you’d be about a mile from here, never looking back. Charlie knew something of what he was—but not all, god no. The only ones who did were the Alchemists, and the less he thought about them and what they had made him do the better.

But the bayous of Louisiana blazed in his memory, like an unnatural fire that burns too hot and for too long, and never goes out.

“Hereabouts, they call me Preach,” the man of indeterminate age said. “You may think you know my name, but you don’t. I’m Preach, even when my women cry out my name when they’re in la petite mort.”

Preach pursed his lips, considering, and his eyes became slitted. “I can see into your mind; I can see clear through you.”

“I can’t say I like the sound of that,” Whitman said.

Preach cawed. “I mean t’tell you! No one likes the sound of what they can’t understand.” He nodded. “We’ll soon remedy that.”

“Why?”

Preach put a hand on Whitman’s shoulder, transmitting a fearsome strength without tightening his grip. “You’re one of us. That’s what I see. You’re one of us, yes, you are. And you’re going to be instrumental in building the newer, better world to come.”

*   *   *

When you’re out here, Charlie thought as she peered through the field glasses, it’s like nothing else exists. No supermarkets, shoe stores, restaurants of the moment. Everyone has a gun, everyone is out to kill you, and that’s what happens here—death, destruction. No one gets out alive, or at least unscathed. How had Whit managed it, all these years? she wondered. This kind of life would eventually drive her mad, she was sure of it. She was also sure that when this mission was over she was going to take up something supremely banal, knitting, maybe. Then she laughed silently. Fat chance. But, in any event, she’d be quits with this job. Besides anything else, working with Whit was like sticking her head in a beehive—unpleasant and perilous in and of itself. She could even learn to hate him—really hate him, not the little-girl spite of their fiery breakup, but true hate with a passion she had not known she possessed. On the other hand, would that be so bad? she wondered. But her thoughts didn’t dwell there for long.

Movement. A column of dust, like a djinn materializing out of the fire of the desert.

“Whit,” Charlie called softly. “Company.”