The Skin Eaters scattered, their gear clanking as they raced to form a thin rank in the murk beyond the stranger. Achamian approached with the Captain and the others, holding Mimara a pace behind him with an outstretched arm. They gathered to either side of the man, standing so as not to obscure the light. Answering to some look or gesture from Lord Kosoter, Xonghis tossed his shield to the floor and knelt before the unknown scalper. Achamian stepped over the shield, glimpsing the three shrunken Sranc heads, joined at the chins, that adorned its centre. Where before he had pressed Mimara back, now he could feel her tugging on the back of his hide cloak, silently urging him to keep his distance. When he glanced back at her, she nodded toward the stranger, directing his gaze to the man’s lap.

The scalper held on to a hand, its fingers cupped like dearly won gold between his palms …

A woman’s severed hand.

“I’ve seen him before,” Kiampas said. “He’s one of the Picks. The Bloody Picks.”

The smeared face flinched at those words. For the first time, the dark eyes wandered from the Bar of Heaven, which rose incandescent on the ingrown horizon. He seemed to search the gaps between their leaning faces.

“Light …” the Pick whispered. He brought the severed hand to his cheek, closed his eyes, and swayed like a child. “Didn’t I promise you light?”

He shrunk from the fingers Xonghis placed on his shoulder. “What happened?” the Imperial Tracker asked, the sternness of his tone somehow softened by the cadences of his Jekki accent. “Where’s your company?”

The man looked at him as though he were some kind of tragic intrusion. “My company …” he repeated.

“Yes,” the Tracker said. “The Bloody Picks. What happened to them? What happened to …”

Xonghis looked up to Kiampas, but it was Lord Kosoter who said, “Captain Mittades.”

“Captain Mittades,” the Tracker repeated. “What happened to him?”

The man began shaking. “M-my-my-my …” he began, blinking his eyes with each stutter. “M-m-m-my c-c-company?” The severed hand had sunk back to his lap.

“Yes. What happened?”

A look of incredulity stretched about rigid terror.

“My c-company? It was too-too-too-too dark—too dark to see the blood … You could only hear it!” His expression clenched at this, his lips pulled inward, as though he were suddenly toothless. “He-he-hear it sucking at their feet as they ran, slapping the walls like little boy hands. Draining like piss … It was too daaaark!”

“Whose feet?” Sarl’s saw-toothed voice broke in. “Whose hands?”

“There’s no light inside,” the man sobbed. “Our skin. Our skin is too thick. It wraps—like a shroud—it keeps the blackness in. And my heart—my heart!—it looks and looks and it can’t see!” A shower of spittle. “There’s nothing to see!”