Monza thought of her own field burning, all those years ago. “You’ve got a point, you can out and say it.”

“That blood only makes more blood. That settling one score only starts another. That war gives a bastard of a sour taste to any man that’s not half-mad, and it only gets worse with time.” She didn’t disagree. “So you know why I’d rather be free of it. Make something grow. Something to be proud of, instead of just breaking. Be… a good man, I guess.”

Snip, snip. Hair tumbled down and gathered on the floor. “A good man, eh?”

“That’s right.”

“So you’ve seen dead men yourself?”

“I’ve seen my share.”

“You’ve seen a lot together?” she asked. “Stacked up after the plague came through, spread out after a battle?”

“Aye, I’ve seen that.”

“Did you notice some of those corpses had a kind of glow about them? A sweet smell like roses on a spring morning?”

Shivers frowned. “No.”

“The good men and the bad, then—all looked about the same, did they? They always did to me, I can tell you that.” It was his turn to stay quiet. “If you’re a good man, and you try to think about what the right thing is every day of your life, and you build things to be proud of so bastards can come and burn them in a moment, and you make sure and say thank you kindly each time they kick the guts out of you, do you think when you die, and they stick you in the mud, you turn into gold?”

“What?”

“Or do you turn to fucking shit like the rest of us?”

He nodded slowly. “You turn to shit, alright. But maybe you can leave something good behind you.”

She barked empty laughter at him. “What do we leave behind but things not done, not said, not finished? Empty clothes, empty rooms, empty spaces in the ones who knew us? Mistakes never made right and hopes rotted down to nothing?”

“Hopes passed on, maybe. Good words said. Happy memories, I reckon.”

“And all those dead men’s smiles you’ve kept folded up in your heart, they were keeping you warm when I found you, were they? How did they taste when you were hungry? They raise a smile, even, when you were desperate?”

Shivers puffed out his cheeks. “Hell, but you’re a ray of sunshine. Might be they did me some good.”

“More than a pocketful of silver would’ve?”

He blinked at her, then away. “Maybe not. But I reckon I’ll try to keep thinking my way, just the same.”

“Hah. Good luck, good man.” She shook her head as if she’d never heard such stupidity. Give me only evil men for friends, Verturio wrote. Them I understand.

A last quick clicking of the scissors and the barber stepped away, dabbing at his own sweaty brow with the back of one sleeve. “And we are all finished.”

Shivers stared into the mirror. “I look a different man.”