“Do you know who that is?” Finch said finally, pointing at the dead gray cap.

Heretic made a sound like something popping. “No. Not familiar to us. We cannot see him,” and Finch understood he meant something other than just looking out a window.

“Have you…?” Couldn’t say the whole sentence. Too ridiculous. Terrifying. At the same time. Have you eaten some of his flesh and picked clean the memories?

But Heretic had been around humans long enough to know what he meant. “We tried it. Nothing that made sense.”

For a second, Finch relaxed. Forgot Heretic could send him, Sintra, anybody he knew, to the work camps.

“If you couldn’t decipher it, how will I?”

Then went stiff. Richard Dorn, a good detective, had questioned Heretic too closely. Nine months to die.

A bullet to the head. In that case.

But the gray cap said only, “With your fresh eyes, maybe you will have better luck.”

Heretic pulled a pouch out of his robes, opened it. Finch rose, stood to the side as Heretic sprinkled a fine green powder over both bodies. Could’ve done it using his own supply, but Heretic enjoyed doing it. For some reason.

“You know what to do,” Heretic said.

In time, a memory bulb would emerge from both corpses’ heads. Did the fanaarcensitii rely too much on what made them comfortable? No autopsies, just mushrooms. But also hardly any experts left to perform them.

Nausea crept back into Finch’s throat. “But I’ve never. Not a gray cap. I mean, not one of your people.”

“We don’t bite.” The grin on that impossible face grew wide and wider. The laughter again, worse.

Finch laughed back, weakly.

“Write down whatever you encounter, whether you understand it or not.”

Mercifully, Heretic looked away. “A gray cap and a man. Dead in such a manner. We need to know everything.”

“Yessir,” Finch said. He couldn’t keep the grimace off his face.

Heretic seemed to take it for a smile. As he walked past on his way to the door, he patted Finch’s elbow. Finch shivered. A touch like wet, dead leaves sewn together and stuffed with meat.

“Report in the morning,” Heretic said. “Report and report and report, Finch.” The laughter again.

Then Heretic was gone. The hallway shadows ate him up, the apartment door opening and closing.

Finch could hear his own breathing. Shallow. The sudden panicked drumming of his heart. The butterfly blinks of the Partial, still snapping photographs.

Took a breath. A second. Closed his eyes.

A sunny day by the river. A picnic lunch. A tree with shade. Long, cool grass. With Sintra.

2

No obvious bullet or stab wounds. No tattoos or other marks. Grunting with the effort, Finch turned the man over for a second. He seemed heavier than he should be. Skin warm, the flesh solid. From the position of the arms, Finch thought they might be broken. A discoloration at the edge of the man’s mouth. Dried blood? When Finch was done, the man settled back into position as if he’d been there a hundred years.