Wren turned on the dim overhead lights, and sparks burst in one bulb before dying. As she broke out in a cold sweat, she cataloged the room to ground herself. In one corner was a table draped in a rust-spotted towel. On it was a tray full of steel surgical instruments arranged in precise rows. Her eyes skirted over a wickedly long bone marrow needle and mallet. Deeper in the room, hunkered in the fold of shadows, was a bed. Someone lay underneath the sheets.

Wren opened her bag and snapped on gloves and a mask. “You don’t have to stay for this. It’s not the same kind of death as on the battlefield.”

“I know. I want to.”

Wren frowned but handed him a mask. “Alright.”

When she felt steady enough, she approached the bed. Every step felt wooden, sent her drifting farther and farther above herself. In the folds of sheet and shadow, she could make out the faint outlines of a face. Goddess above, she did not want to do this. But someone had to bear witness to what had been done here.

With a trembling hand, she peeled back the sheet to reveal a young man. He had dull, half-open eyes, blond hair like a shock of goldenrod, and a mouth missing a cigarette. Wren took a deep, steadying breath against the tide of her horror, her grief. At long last, she’d found the proof she was looking for.

This was Jacob Byers’s body.

Focus. Fall apart later.

She could do this. For just a few minutes, she could be objective and cold. As she forced her eyes back to his pallid face, she noted he was in the earlier stages of autolysis. No bloating. No liquefaction of the organs or fluid oozing from the orifices. Only a faint yellow discoloration and blistering of the flesh. If she had to estimate, he’d been dead for fewer than twenty-four hours. Which meant they’d been here when he died.

She could have saved him. But she was too late.

A soft sob escaped her. Deep down, she’d known none of Lowry’s victims had survived. Until now, she’d still been clinging to hope. She’d still believed that maybe Byers would shuffle back into the office one day, reeking of tobacco and asking about what he’d missed. Just a few weeks ago, they’d been holed up together, filing Una’s paperwork and laughing at each other’s jokes. He slacked off and burnt the coffee. She needled him and did the work. That was her life. It was routine.