Further back, behind the silent, hooded acolytes, who carried barnacle-encrusted swords and left trails of saltwater behind them, like they carried the sea itself in their pockets, came the villagers from the nameless settlement that lay beneath the Abbey. To be a villager on the Moors was to be a pawn in the long, slow game of life and death played between monsters, and they knew what was expected of them. They marched with grim expressions on their faces and the tools of their trade in their hands, baling hooks and fishing spears and tridents. Some of their number carried torches as well. Fire and water stood in opposition, but the casual reminder that most things could be flammable under the right circumstances was tradition, and tradition had a large part to play in this encounter.

Jack held the reins but didn’t move them, trusting Pony and Bones to know the way, and tried not to think of Alexis, alone in the windmill, waiting for her to come home. Alexis wouldn’t care if Jack won or if she lost, only that she survived, and Jack wished she could be that generous with herself; wished, with a fierce inner loathing, that she could be that generous for Alexis. If they failed to get her body back, she was going to break. Maybe not tonight, maybe not for weeks or even months, but she could feel the fault lines forming, could barely fight the urge to score her sister’s unwanted flesh with her fingernails, trying to scrape enough of it away that she could find the cleanliness buried somewhere deep within.

They had to win. If they lost, even if she lived, she died, and it would be the kind of death that lightning couldn’t save her from. They had to win.

Clouds gathered overhead, obscuring the great red eye of the moon. In the distance, thunder rolled, and a cold wind swept across the Moors, rattling the brush and chilling the flesh of the marchers. Jack flicked the reins, keeping her eyes only on their destination.

“It will be all right,” said Sumi. “People will die or they won’t, but either way, it’s almost at an ending, and things that are almost at an ending have a way of making their opinions known.”

“If that was meant to be comforting, you’re worse at this than I am,” said Jack.

“Not comforting; comfort comes later. How well do you know Gideon?”

“He was here before me. His door dropped him on the seashore. I suppose the Moon makes some of our choices for us, and then everyone tries to pretend that She didn’t. That’s the trouble with gods. They don’t care much how poorly they treat their toys.”

“Mmm. Does he like girls?”