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Most people were charmed by Osric—or, if they knew what he was, terrified of him. Fairhrim was neither. She approached with the grim determination of a soldier setting off to war.

Osric found himself almost looking forward to their inevitable skirmish. There was, after all, something curative in the drawing of blood.

“You’re late,” said Fairhrim. She sniffed in his direction. “I smell burning.”

“Just a corpse,” said Osric, shaking out his greatcoat. “Lingers a bit.”

Fairhrim’s condemnation came in the form of pursed lips, which remained pursed as Osric rearranged his coat.

“Are you waiting for a kiss?” asked Osric. “It was a Fyren, if that makes you feel better.”

He waited for Fairhrim to assimilate this information. She assimilated. The pursedness disappeared. “I suppose thatisgood news. Why were you burning one of your own?”

“He was naughty,” said Osric.

“You’re all naughty.”

“He betrayed one of my Order’s most fundamental tenets.”

Fairhrim asked, with asperity: “Isn’t that what you’re doing as we speak?”

“Yes.”

“Will you be next, then?” enquired Fairhrim, with an offensive amount of anticipation.

“Not if you do what I paid you to do,” said Osric.

“You paid for something impossible. Do you think I might attend the burning when this endeavour inevitably fails?”

“It won’t fail,” said Osric, wishing he were as convinced as he sounded.

Fairhrim stepped up to Osric and peered into his face. Osric did not move so she wouldn’t win.

“Obstinacy and hope,” said Fairhrim. “What a foolish combination.”

“I prefer strong-willed,” said Osric.

“I’ll mention that in your eulogy when I attend your farewell barbecue.”

“There will be no farewell barbecue.”

“All right,” said Fairhrim in the tone one takes with a stupid idiot whom one no longer cares to argue with. “How’s your seith? Any changes since last month?”

“The fluctuations are getting worse. The numbness has spread.”

“You’re still able to use it, which is the good news.” Fairhrim’s eyes slid over him. So penetrating was her gaze that Osric felt she might actually slice him open and have a look within. “I’ve got just enough seith for our healing attempt. I decided to put my faith in the maths, even if everything about this course of treatment is naive, uncontrolled, and suboptimal. I’ve put together a plan for today based on what seem to be the most successful parameters linked to the Hara moon. I have little confidence that it will work, of course, but we only have so many full moons—and I’ve only got so much seith.”

Fairhrim snapped her hand in the direction of a bridleway. “Let’s talk as we go. We’ve got a bit of a walk.”

Osric followed her along the path. “Where are we going?”

“Along the South Downs,” said Fairhrim. “This place has the full repertoire—it’s on the cusp between earth and sea, it’s got a long history of unexplained phenomena at the Hara moon, and it’s positively studded with ancient barrows.”

“Barrows?”

“Burial mounds.”

“We like barrows?”