They had come to the edge of the village at a time of usual quiet: midnight. The river ran nearby; the scant flow of dry season was so muted as to be nearly inaudible under the shrill, incessant chirping of frogs and crickets.

“You know me better than to say that,” Chance murmured. “Nothing wrong with pausing to think for a moment instead of running amok.”

The Trickster paced a short track up and down the bank while Chance stood silent, head slightly bowed and arms folded, expressionless in the dark. Finally the pacing steps slowed and stopped.

“Chance, what will happen to us when we die—as humans?” His tone was unusually subdued.

“I don’t know,” Chance admitted. “Perhaps when the ending of the mortal thread is complete, we will go back to being purely undying and not this betwixt and between.”

“Perhaps we will simply cease to exist,” the Trickster countered, a nasty edge to his voice. “A full and final death.”

“So? When all the paths have been walked, all the threads traveled—some twice and thrice over—that which I call ‘I’ will eventually fragment and dissolve, and my essence will return to whence it came. The journey will be complete, the tapestry finished. It is not a death, but it is still an end.” His words turned poetic with a singing cadence that nonetheless sounded very somber.

The Trickster shook his head with a wry smile, recognizing the ritual chant in Chance’s words. “Do you really trust Patience to know everything, much less tell us what she knows?”

Chance sighed. “I cannot even trust the angels to do that. Why me? I asked the one who summoned me, and they gave me a nonanswer about my being an expert on human and undying interactions. And when I saw it was Miranda—”

The Trickster chuckled. “Yes, I thought that was amusing. That’s when I suspected Patience was involved. She likes counterpoint patterning. She’s very good at it.”

“Amusing, you say. Perhaps not. Perhaps I’ve been mistaken about everything. You know what the real problem is.”

“Yes.” The Trickster began pacing again, but more meditatively. “The fact that you cannot approach this undying one suggests that you share the same essence.”

Startled and angry, Chance glared at his brother for daring to voice such a thing. “What do you mean? You haven’t been able to approach him either. You couldn’t get close to the time of the murders.”

“Of course, he’s done his best to hide his presence from other undying,” said the Trickster, speaking in a gentler voice. “That’s not what I’m referring to. When we joined to protect Miranda and he attacked us, the shock was formidable, but it was all sound and rage and buffeting—except when he tried to rip me apart. I felt that. But Chance, he wasn’t able to touch any part of the shield that was you.”