Raker

I looked around. No Soulcatcher. Goblin and One-Eye were back, dead to the world. Otto and Hagop were snoring like giants. "How's Otto?"

"Doing all right. What've you been up to?"

I settled myself beside our fire, prized my boots off. My feet were blue but not frozen. Soon they tingled painfully. My legs ached from all that walking through the snow, too. I told Elmo the whole story.

"You killed him?"

"Raven said the Captain wants done with the project."

"Yeah. I didn't figure Raven would go cut his throat."

"Where's Soulcatcher?"

"Hasn't been back." He gri

My hands and feet felt halfway human. I scooted over and nabbed Otto's boots. He was about my size, and he didn't need them.

Out into the night again. Morning, almost. Dawn was due soon.

If I expected any remonstrance from Raven, I was disappointed. He just looked at me. I think he actually shivered. I remember thinking, maybe he's human after all. "Had to change my boots." Then, "Elmo's getting the wagon. The rest of them are passed out."

"Soulcatcher?"

"Not back yet."

"Let's plant this seed." He strode into the swirling flakes. I hurried after him.

The snow had not collected on our trap. It sat there glowing gold. Water puddled beneath it and trickled away to become ice.

"You think Soulcatcher will know when this thing gets discharged?" I asked.

"It's a good bet. Goblin and One-Eye, too."

"The place could burn down around those two and they wouldn't turn over."

"Nevertheless.... Sshh! Somebody out there. Go that way." He moved the other direction, circling.

What am I doing this for? I thought as I skulked through the snow, weapon in hand. I ran into Raven. "See anything?"

He glared into the darkness. "Somebody was here." He sniffed the air, turned his head slowly right and left. "Come on." He took a dozen quick steps, pointed down.

He was right. The trail was fresh. The departing half looked hurried.

I stared at those marks. "I don't like it, Raven."

Our visitor's spoor indicated that he dragged his right foot.

"The Limper."

"We don't know for sure."

"Who else? Where's Elmo?"

We returned to the Raker trap, waited impatiently. Raven paced. He muttered. I could not recall ever having seen him this unsettled. Once, he said, "The Limper isn't Soulcatcher."

Really. Soulcatcher is almost human. The Limper is as cruel and inhuman as the Taken come. The sort of creature who enjoys torturing babies.

A jangle of traces and squeak of poorly greased wheels entered the plaza. Elmo and the wagon appeared. Elmo pulled up and jumped down.

"Where the hell you been?" Fear and weariness made me cross.

"Takes time to dig out a stableboy and get a team ready. What's the matter? What happened?"

"The Limper was here."

"Oh, shit. What'd he do?"

"Nothing. He just...."

"Let's move," Raven snapped. "Before he comes back." He took the head to the stone. The wardspells might not have existed. He fitted the trophy into the waiting cavity. The golden glow winked out. Snowflakes began accumulating on head and stone.

"Let's go," Elmo gasped. "We won't have much time."

I grabbed a sack and heaved it into the wagon. Thoughtful Elmo had laid out a tarp to keep loose coins from dribbling between the floorboards.

Raven told me to rake up the loose stuff under the table. "Elmo, empty some of those sacks and give them to Croaker."

They heaved bags. I scrambled after loose coins.

"One minute gone," Raven said. Half the bags were in the wagon.

"Too much loose stuff," I said.

"We'll leave it if we have to."

"What're we going to do with it? How'11 we hide it?"

"In the hay in the stable," Raven said. "For now. Later we put a false bed in the wagon. Two minutes gone."

"What about wagon tracks?" Elmo asked. "He could follow them to the stable."

"Why should he care in the first place?" I wondered aloud.

Raven ignored me. He asked Elmo, "You didn't cancel them coming here?"

"Didn't think of it."

"Damn!"

All the sacks were aboard. Elmo and Raven helped with the loose stuff.

"Three minutes," Raven said, then, "Quiet!" He listened. "Soulcatcher couldn't be here already, could he? No. The Limper again. Come on. You drive, Elmo. Head for a thoroughfare. Lose us in traffic. I'll follow you. Croaker, go try to cover Elmo's back-trail."

"Where is he?" Elmo asked, staring into the falling snow.

Raven pointed. "We'll have to lose him. Or he'll take it away. Go on, Croaker. Get moving. Elmo."

"Get up!" Elmo snapped his traces. The wagon creaked away.

I ducked under the table and stuffed my pockets, then ran away from where Raven said the Limper was.

XIV

I don't know that I had much luck obscuring Elmo's back trail. I think we were helped more by morning traffic than anything I did. I did get rid of the stableboy. I gave him a sock full of gold and silver, more than he could make in years of stable work, and asked him if he could lose himself. Away from Roses, preferably. He told me, "I won't even stop to get my things." He dropped his pitchfork and headed out, never to be seen again.

I hied myself back to our room.

Everyone was sleeping but Otto. "Oh, Croaker," he said. "Bout time."

"Pain?"

"Yeah."

"Hangover?"

"That too."

"Let's see what we can do. How long you been awake?"

"An hour, I guess."

"Soulcatcher been here?"

"No. What happened to him, anyway?"

"I don't know."

"Hey. Those are my boots. What the hell you think you're doing, wearing my boots?"

"Take it easy. Drink this."

He drank. "Come on. What're you doing wearing my boots?"

I removed the boots and set them near the fire, which had burned quite low. Otto kept after me while I added coal. "If you don't calm down you're going to rip your stitches."

I will say this for our people. They pay attention when my advice is medical. Angry as he was, he lay back, forced himself to lie still. He did not stop cussing.

I shed my wet things and do

I was cleaning around the wound, and Otto was cursing softly when I heard the sound: Scrape-dump, scrape clump. It stopped outside the door.

Otto sensed my fear. "What's the matter?"

"It's...." The door opened behind me. I glanced back. I'd guessed right.

The Limper went to the table, dropped into a chair, surveyed the room. His gaze skewered me.

Inanely, I said, "I just started tea."

He stared at the wet boots and cloak, then at each man in the room. Then at me again.

The Limper is not a big man. Barely over five feet tall, and of slightly under average build. Meeting him in the street, not knowing what he was, you would not be impressed. Like Soulcatcher, he was clad in a single color, a dingy brown. He was ragged. His face was concealed by a battered leather mask which drooped. Tangled threads of hair protruded from under his hood and around his mask. It was grey peppered with black.

He did not say a word. Just sat there and stared. Not knowing what else to do, I finished tending Otto, then made the tea. I poured three tin cups, gave one to Otto, set one before the Limper, took the third myself....

What now? No excuse to be busy.

Nowhere to sit but at that table.... Oh, shit!

The Limper removed his mask. He raised the tin cup....

I could not tear my gaze away.

His was the face of a dead man, of a mummy improperly preserved. His eyes were alive and baleful, yet directly beneath one was a patch of flesh which had rotted. Beneath his nose, at the right corner of his mouth, a square inch of lip was missing, revealing gum and yellowed teeth.