Leesil nodded, and signaled Chap to follow him. Before he stepped back into the house, he looked at Magiere standing near the fire, hair bound in a tail, and the flames feeding blood-glimmers into her black hair in the early-morning light. She was tired and worn in her damaged armor, falchion on her hip, but she gazed pensively into the pyre. Leesil felt suddenly afraid he'd pushed her too far the night before. He turned into the house.

Stopping short of the parlor and Sapphire's body, he glanced to the cellar stairs. If there were any uncertainty for the demise of an undead, there was one he wanted to be certain of first. He headed down to the passage into the sewers.

Leesil didn't relish a return to the city's underbelly, but the distance seemed shorter somehow, as Chap led the way. They found Ratboy's body lodged against the walkway a little way down from the intersection where Leesil had taken his head. The severed hand seemed to have been washed away.

"He looks dead to me," Leesil said.

Chap yipped once in agreement, but they weren't about to argue with Magiere. Leesil dragged the waterlogged corpse all the way back and dropped it next to Sapphire's in the parlor. He was about to climb to the second floor, and instead returned to crouch next to Sapphire's corpse.

A thin, raised line in the congealed black fluids on the carpet had caught his attention. Leesil slipped out a stiletto and poked at it. It shifted slightly, and he hooked it with the blade's tip to pull it out.

It was a necklace covered by dark ichor. He wiped it with the skirt of the blue gown, and before him hung a gold pendant with a sapphire the size of his small fingernail.

Leesil stared at it in thought, knowing just how Magiere would react if she caught him pilfering the dead-or the undead, for that matter. There might be long months ahead, and what the council would pay them needed to go to Miiska.

Spoils of war, he thought, and finished roughly wiping it off before tucking it into his hauberk. He would deal with Magiere later, when objections were pointless. If later still remained a possibility in her mind. Then another thought occurred to him.

A gown with a matching stone. And if there were other gowns…?

He was about to head upstairs when Wynn scurried through the front door.

"You have to stop this," she urged. The outright dread upon her face was plain to see. "You cannot let Magiere burn bodies in the middle of a public street!"

Leesil was about to answer when Magiere stepped through the door behind the young sage.

"You find Ratboy?" she asked him.

Leesil nodded. "He's in the parlor. I'll bring the third one down, the one we found already dead last night."

"Time to finish this," Magiere added. "People are already out and about, and that's not such a terrible thing-though they may not agree when they see what we're doing."

She headed back outside and down to the pyre.

Leesil sensed there was more to this than burning undeads to be certain of their destruction. Wynn looked at him uncomfortably. While the little scholar respected Magiere, she would never understand all of it.

"She hates to admit it," Leesil said. "But deep inside, Magiere likes the drama of a good show. She's angry that these creatures lived comfortably amidst the wealthy, and none of these fools appeared to know or care enough to realize what was happening. We'll shake them out of their complacency."

"Oh…" Wynn answered. "Is she still angry with me over Chane?"

For a moment, Leesil tried to find some way to spare her feelings, to understand what she had done. But he couldn't.

"You were wrong, Wynn. You should've done anything in your power to help Magiere take his head."

Wynn stepped back, and it was perhaps the first time he'd seen her grow cold and harsh.

"I had a place among you in this," she said. "You, Magiere, and Chap possess strength and courage beyond anyone I have known, but you lack conscience. I was that conscience last night. Not all beings of a kind are the same, Leesil. And I believe it is possible not all Noble Dead are the same."

Her answer surprised him. He appreciated how she stood by her convictions, even if she was completely naive.

"If you still want to help," he said, "go out there and keep people away from Magiere as best you can. One wrong word and… well, you know her enough to guess the worst."

Wynn sighed deeply, still not at all pleased, but she nodded and headed out to the street.

Leesil didn't stop at the body on the second floor. Instead, he opened the doors there to briefly inspect the rooms, but neither held what he looked for. It was in the last room of the top floor that he reached his goal. He entered and pulled aside the thick curtains and shutters to let in the daylight.

The room was decorated in peach and white, and Leesil grimaced at the decor. He inspected the closet and confirmed his suspicions-gowns of varied hues, all of costly fabrics and frills. He wasted no time and rummaged through the wardrobe and vanity and found what he sought. The walnut box was only slightly ornate, and inside were trinkets, earrings, and necklaces, all seasoned with stones and gems, some of which he couldn't identify.

He closed the box.

No one would miss it, not from a place such as this, but he thought of Magiere and the horrifying scene they were creating in the street. He thought of people who'd never know where their friends and family disappeared to in the night. He thought of the council, who'd still be hiding all this from their citizens, if not for the pyre about to be fed.

Leesil slipped the box back into the drawer with a better purpose for it in mind.

Back at the body on the second floor, he opened the sack with the two heads and was about to add the third when he noticed a wad of cloth caught beneath Toret's head. He pulled it out of the sack to discover it was a satchel or purse.

Inside was a small collection of pennies, groats, shills, and even one sovereign, the assortment roughly equal in both silver and gold. One more thing for Magiere to get angry about, and he shoved the purse into his hauberk with the necklace.

He added the third head to his sack, and hauled the corpse down the stairs. He left it in the foyer and dragged Toret's out first.

People watched from their windows, a few gathered upon the street at a safe distance, but no one approached. As Leesil approached the blaze, Magiere grabbed Toret's legs, and they tossed the headless corpse upon the pyre.

Sparks rose in the air, and Wynn recoiled. Chap merely sat near the street's edge, watching intently. Leesil returned to the house.

When the last body was fed to the flames, people crowded together at either end of the street. Smoke thickened in the morning air, carrying with it the stench of burning flesh.

Chap suddenly barked and stood up.

Leesil saw Captain Chetnik in a wagon coming straight toward them through the crowd. Vatz was seated next to the captain, and several guards sat behind. The crackling roar of the pyre and mill of the crowds had masked the wagon's approach.

As the wagon halted, Chetnik appeared stunned by the sight on the street. He jumped out, imposing with his wide girth and white surcoat and mass of dark curling hair hidden beneath the three-crested helmet. He strode purposefully toward Magiere.

"Have you lost all reason?" he demanded.

Magiere stood with arms crossed, facing the fire.

Leesil reached into the sack and pulled out Ratboy's head. "Look in its mouth."

Chetnik leaned away. He'd rarely spoken to Leesil, and he stopped, uncertain. Cautiously, the captain reached out and pushed back the head's stiffened, pale lips to reveal long, canine eyeteeth.

"We have bodies to burn," Leesil said. "It's the only way to be certain."