Iron Angel

And on it went.

Rachel listened to their ranting for a while longer, and then interrupted. “Where is Mina Greene now?”

“In Hell, I suppose,” said Mr. Hightower.

Rachel and Trench exchanged a glance.

“Mr. Hightower!” exclaimed Bloom.

“I don’t care to listen to you anymore, Mr. Bloom.” The scientist’s damp eyes turned back to Rachel. “There’s power in this forest, places where Hell bubbles up close to the surface. It’s because of all the heathens who have died here-the sands have drunk a lot of blood, you see.” A strand of drool extended from his lip. “Miss Greene is a collector of horrors, and she became quite animated when we explained all of this to her.”

“When you explained it,” said Bloom. “You couldn’t keep your mouth shut then, and you can’t keep it shut now.”

Mr. Hightower looked peevish. “I thought she would let us go if she realized that there were more interesting specimens to be discovered nearby.” He stared down at the sand with a pitiful expression. “But she didn’t. She simply swanned off in the direction of a particularly nasty toxic cache to look for ghosts. She said she’d be gone an hour or two.”

“And this was six days ago?” Rachel asked.

“The whole forest is riddled with little holes into Hell,” said Mr. Hightower. “I suppose something terrible must have happened to her.”

“He’s like this with the phantasms, too,” said Mr. Bloom. “He won’t stop talking at them. And now they’re so completely bored with him they don’t even haunt us anymore.”

“That’s unfair, Mr. Bloom.”

Rachel decided to leave them to it. She didn’t have to go far to find Mr. Partridge. He was, as she had suspected, lying right behind the puppet booth itself. Looking at his slack body, bundled into a black suit and white frilled shirt, she couldn’t help but think of an oversized slug. Partridge had a shock of white hair and glazed eyes which looked in two directions at once. He was licking the red-and-black-spattered root of a tree.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” she said.

By moving in a series of jerking motions, Mr. Partridge somehow managed to swivel himself around. “This particular toxin,” he said gruffly, like a schoolteacher reprimanding a pupil, “happens to be one of my favorites. It helps me think clearly, while relieving the itching sensation in my backbone.”

“You don’t have a backbone.”

“Are you mad?” he said. “Of course I don’t have a backbone.”

He shuffled back around and went back to lapping at the root.

Rachel could not see how further conversation with these men could improve the situation. All three of them were clearly unhinged. If these toxins couldn’t actually kill Mr. Partridge, then what did it matter if she left him to enjoy them? She shook her head, and returned the way she had come.

Hightower and Bloom were still-as she could hear-arguing with each other. “They seem harmless enough,” Rachel said, stepping down from the wagon. “We should cut them down.”

Trench was staring at the two hanging men with contempt. “What would they do then?” he grunted. “Flap around the place like fish? Would that be any better than leaving them where they are? Once they leave this wood, someone will only find them and abuse them.

They have no way to defend against that.”

“They want to be free.”

He shrugged. “As you wish.” He helped lift each man down from the stage in turn while Rachel severed their ropes. Meanwhile, Mr. Hightower and Mr. Bloom did not stop arguing until their limp bodies were stretched out lying side by side on the sand.

“We are down, Mr. Bloom.”

“I see that, Mr. Hightower.”

Both men’s glances moved rapidly about them, as though assimilating the view from this new and strange perspective. Mr. Hightower tried to move first. By flexing the muscles in his shoulders, arms, and legs, he managed to squirm an inch forward. His hat fell off.

“Did you see that, Mr. Bloom? I am mobile.”

“You are indeed, Mr. Hightower!”

“Then let us race!”

“A race, Mr. Hightower?” The other man sounded excited. “Yes, yes, but to where?”

“To Mr. Partridge, of course. I intend to murder the scoundrel for leaving us to rot up there all this time.”

“Not before I do, Mr. Hightower. Not before I do!”

With much exciting grunting and wriggling, the two Soft Men headed off just like snails without their shells.

Their numbers had grown again since nightfall. In addition to forty or so riders, the Heshette raiders had now acquired a further dozen men on foot, three hags who claimed to be seers, two dogs, and a herd of goats.

News of a sighting reached the party when they were less than half a league from Cinderbark Wood. One of the outriders returned, his mount steaming in the fog, to tell them that he’d witnessed the Spine assassin and her companion entering the grove of poisonous trees.

Ramnir frowned as he spoke to John Anchor. “This woodland is a dangerous place,” he said. “Deepgate’s chemists went to work on it with every poison in their arsenal.”

Anchor shrugged his massive shoulders. “It is no big problem for me,” he said. “I don’t die so easily.”

“Yet your rope might become entangled.”

“It happens often.” The giant gave him a huge grin. “I just keep walking, no problem.”

Ramnir laughed and clapped the black man on the arm. “Then our elders and women will bring the livestock to the eastern fringes of the wood while our warriors accompany you into the trees, John Anchor.”

Jack Caulker scowled. He didn’t like the way these heathens had attached themselves so closely to the giant. They’d obviously seen profit in this situation and they’d stuck to it like bone glue. No doubt every one of them had an eye on Anchor’s soulpearls. This display of jovial camaraderie they had put on for the giant’s benefit was clearly faked. Now they were going into Cinderbark fucking Wood of all places. Everyone who’d ever gone there left it insane-if they left the cover of the trees at all.

Well, Caulker wasn’t about to join them. “We’ll ride with the livestock,” he announced from the rear of his shared gelding. “We shall be waiting on the far side in case the two of them get away from you.”

At this the remainder of the horsemen snorted and laughed, and called him a coward. The rider in control of Caulker’s mount laughed as loud as the others. “Not all the livestock will miss this hunt, then,” he cried. “I’m carrying one of them here on my horse. Did you hear it bleat just then?”

Caulker fumed. Where was Hammer Eric now, when the cutthroat needed some muscle to emphasize his point of view? These idiots would kill themselves in Cinderbark Wood. But he smiled gracefully. An idea had just occurred to him-a way in which he might change the situation to his favor. He swung his leg over the horse in order to dismount. But just at that moment his horseman twitched the reins, urging their shared mount forward. Caulker lost his balance and fell clumsily, landing on his rear in the sand.

A chorus of laughter and hoots went up from the gathered Heshette riders.

The cutthroat scrambled to his feet, his face hot with rage. “If any one of you is man enough to fight me,” he cried, “then-”

A dozen blades rasped from their sheaths all around him.

Caulker felt the blood leave his face. “Then I would obviously refuse,” he said quickly. “The desert folk are not my enemies. We’ve shared fire and water, for which I am grateful. And if you’re ever in Sandport, look me up so that I can return the favor.” He prayed that they would. Hammer Eric knew a dock official who collected Heshette ears. “But it seems to me that we’re facing a great deal of danger ahead. We’re all weary after the long trek here, and a man needs all of his wits in Cinderbark Wood.”

“We are not weary,” Ramnir said, sheathing his blade. “That trek, as you call it, was naught but a gentle excursion to us.”

“Then I admire your stamina as much as your generosity. But I’m a sailor, unused to horses and sand.” He