I gasp as my eyes open. My hand comes up to rub across my face, and I find tears. The image of her is still imprinted in my mind. She’d been so damn real. I should be relieved that we’ve finally broken out of our dream—where we’re so vulnerable to Constantine’s suspicions—but instead I’m just desperately empty. Leaving Talin feels like ripping my heart out of my chest. I wince. I can feel the pain of it as if my body is still torn open.

My eyes wander to Jeran. He’s asleep. I was supposed to have stayed awake during my shift guarding us atop this train. Guiltily, I shift so that my weight is sure to block him from rolling off the top of the car, and then I look around at the rest of the train.

My gaze settles on the platform several cars ahead of us, the one carrying the heavy artifact.

I’m grateful for the darkness that hides us from the few workers stationed to guard the artifact. They are still there, swaying with the train cars. At first I think they are all clustered together in sleep—but then I see that a couple of them are holding up one of the workers as he vomits over the side of the train car, his figure hunched over in pain.

You would think they would all be used to the motion of a train by now. I’m surprised any of them could be sick because of it.

It takes me another moment to realize that the ill worker is vomiting a trickle of blood, inky black, into the night. I know what it looks like, of course—I’ve seen plenty of blood in darkness. As if to confirm it, I can smell the faint scent of something metallic in the wind. My insides recoil.

The worker must have some old injury. Maybe it was made worse during the struggle to secure the artifact. I look on, feeling queasy myself, as the worker continues to retch until he finally slumps backward in exhaustion.

Over on the other side of the artifact, another worker is also vomiting over the side of the moving platform. Even from here, I can hear the occasional moan coming from him.

That man, too, is retching blood.

My grief over Talin fades momentarily as I watch them. Eventually, they seem to settle back down into a restless sleep. More old injuries? Somehow, it doesn’t quite make sense to me. My eyes go from their resting figures to that strangely familiar metal cylinder, and I concentrate on the faint glow it seems to emit.

Maybe it’s my imagination. Maybe it’s just the way the lights from an occasional village hit the artifact whenever the train curves along its track.

But something about it feels off. It’s the same feeling I remember as a child, watching Karensa’s parades of early Ghosts down Cardinia’s avenues. The same feeling I had during each year’s solstice festivities when red paper rained down on me even as prisoners of war were hauled through the streets.