‘Some of the bodies were washed down by meltwater,’ said Eisenhorn. ‘So we have no idea where they were killed.’

‘But the ones that were found in situ? Where you presume they were slain?’

‘No,’ said Macks. ‘No residue.’

‘That’s odd,’ said Drusher.

‘Expand,’ said Eisenhorn.

‘It suggests those locations were not the scenes of the crimes, so to speak. It suggests the killing and perhaps even the feeding happened elsewhere.’

‘They were dump sites?’ asked Macks.

‘They were dump sites,’ Drusher nodded.

‘That’s criminal pathology,’ said Eisenhorn.

‘It is,’ agreed Drusher. ‘Ursids may have grazed the kills and destroyed evidence. That might have been intentional. But the victims were killed elsewhere, then dumped. Add to that, the extremely unlikely coincidence that all the victims cannot be identified on any local or planetary database. Even rogue ursid man-eaters do not select their prey on the basis of identity profiling. Which means, you’re looking for human actors, inquisitor. Men did this. This is serial execution or serial murder.’

He looked at Eisenhorn.

‘But you knew that already, didn’t you?’ Drusher asked.

Eisenhorn didn’t reply.

‘Then tell me, if you want me to work at optimum efficiency,’ said Drusher, ‘what brought the Inquisition into this?’

‘Eighteen deaths,’ said Nayl flatly.

‘No,’ said Drusher, still looking straight at Eisenhorn. ‘That’s a dreadful tally, but serial murder is still within the purview of the Marshal Division. There’s something else. You have positively identified at least one of these bodies, haven’t you? Long before you even got here.’

Seven

SEVEN

Spirits of Place

Drusher put on his coat, slung his satchel over his shoulder and went for a walk. The rain had eased back, and the sky over the valley was a hazy blue.

There was a woman at the fortress gate, a glum woman in Magistratum gear. Her name badge read ‘Edde’, and she carried a riotgun.

‘Where are you going, sir?’ she asked.

‘I need to examine a few things,’ Drusher replied. It seemed to him a better answer than ‘I have to get away from these people for a while’.

‘Have you been given permission to exit?’ she asked.

‘Of course I have,’ he lied. No one had said anything to him about anything. After his assessment of the bodies in the cold store, Drusher felt as though he might have crossed a line. Eisenhorn had said nothing, except to send them all out of the room. Drusher wasn’t sure if he’d revealed truths that had given the inquisitor new things to ponder, or if he’d exposed some secrets Eisenhorn had been keeping to himself. Had he impressed Eisenhorn into silence, or aggravated him? Eisenhorn was impossible to read. He didn’t appear to express any nuance of reaction except a grim glare.

Deputy Edde looked at Drusher for a moment, then sighed and unlocked the gates.