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On the way back to his flat Walt passed one of the large city clocks and saw that it was late afternoon. The sun burned through the remnant stormclouds, turning the soaked streets into blinding mirrors wherever its rays struck water. He trudged onward, feeling spent and vulnerable without his sword; he tried to focus on keeping his glamor in place, and walking.

He did not live in the better part of town. It was a large, old neighborhood, a forest of quaint but dingy townhouses and tightly packed flats, all let out by the same disinterested businessman-- a man who did live in the better part of town and preferred to stay there as much as possible. There were too many tenants for anyone to ever get to know anyone else.

Walt occupied a large top floor walk-up in a brick building with five floors, and took great pains never to socialize with anyone other than the postman. To know folk elsewhere in the city-- that was one thing. But he knew he wouldn't last long if he entertained the solicitations of his curious neighbors. His freedom depended on keeping his nature hidden, especially when he was living in a city like Durem.

As he climbed the stairs, a bitter thought flashed through his mind: the thought that without Vivienne, there was nothing left for him in Durem. He gripped the banister tightly and stopped, struggling to take it back, to correct himself. He was not "without" Vivienne. They would meet again. If they did not meet again for a while, he would write her. This would all be sorted out.

He went on up the stairs, with greater haste than was needed. He knew he was lying to himself. The righteous anger that drove him to kill Ederud and his men and made him so certain that Vivienne was not involved had left him. Now he could only wonder why she was so determined to escape him.

He unlocked the door to his flat with his right hand and opened it. When he was inside he immediately removed his blood-soaked shoes and kicked them into a corner for later, to see if they were salvageable.

His bandaged eye had been itching fiercely for hours. As the door closed behind him, he ripped the tape off the dressing, but held the gauze in place and headed for the bathroom. Over the sink he pulled out the packing itself and the relief was like orgasm. He felt the pus ooze down over his cheek, grabbed a washrag to keep it from dripping and soiling his clothing further. He tried to reach up with his left arm again, without thinking; the pain fell over him in a great shuddering wave and his balance gave way.

"********," he hissed, dropping the cloth to steady himself against the sink. His face in the mirror was ghastly-- the good eye encircled by a dark ring, the skin beaded with sweat. His hair clung to his face. Pinkish pus seeped out from the corners of the injured eye and crusted the lashes shut. When he regained his breath, he retrieved the wet towel from the basin where it had fallen and scrubbed at the mess. As he pulled the cloth across the eye, the pus came away in strings, like mucous.

When he was done he stared into the mirror at the vertical scar tissue slashed across the eyelid and opened it, holding the washrag just beneath it. The orb of an eye had formed again, there, but it wept the rosy fluid, and was still without sight.

Having established this, he showered and dressed the wounds again and donned the only spare eye patch he had-- the other one was lost somewhere in Sonia's apartment. He did not expect to get it back.

Walt was headed for his sitting room when he heard a rasping noise within, fabric against fabric. He froze. The door had been locked-- no signs of a break-in. Nobody else had a key to the place. The contents of his rooms were undisturbed.

He placed his good hand on the doorknob and waited.

"You can open the door, you know." The voice was drowsy, feminine, and convivial. Familiar. He knew who it was, but Walt stood still for a moment in quiet panic, searching through the vault of his memory. Did he owe her a favor? Was it worth abandoning everything in his flat to simply turn around and leave right now, and never come back to Durem?

"Mariah," he said.

"Twenty-three years," she reminded him, sweetly. "Open the door, darling."

He did. If not for the unmistakable twinkle of malice in her eye, and the lopsided, ill-meaning smile, he might have taken her for someone else. A young working woman in urban Aekea, maybe-- with a sensible, modern coat in hunter green, and tattered jeans. The chair she'd been sitting in creaked as she rose from it. "Obedient," she said. "You know you aren't under contract anymore, Walter. I thought you'd run."

"It would've been wiser."

"Oh, don't make me the bad guy," she said. She twisted a finger into her hair, white blonde tipped in black. He had the dim impression that this had been en vogue among the lower class at some point not too long ago, but the way she'd styled it was the old way, the up-do, something for an evening out. "Maybe I only came by to say hi. Maybe I wanted to thank you."

"I doubt it."

"Well, believe it." Her smile widened. "You just stepped into a snake pit. Ederud? Oh, my. Talk about making a fuss."

"Ederud might be the most friendless man in Durem," he said. "I'm not concerned."

"There's an ecosystem, here. I don't need to explain that to you."

"Then don't, please," Walt said. He crossed the room to his desk and opened each of the drawers in turn to make sure Mariah hadn't been rifling through them. "And what does the criminal ecosystem of Durem have to do with you wanting to thank me?"

"I've got a little project I'm working on in this burg. Sort of subtle. Lots of tiny working pieces, the kind you have to slip into place when humans aren't looking. Money can't buy the kind of decoy you just made for me."

"Then I'm glad to have been of service," Walt said, slamming the final drawer shut. "Now, if you'd please leave--"

Mariah leaned forward, resting her hands on the desk. "I'd suggest that you leave."

"You were the one who reminded me I'm not under contract any longer," he said.

She rolled her eyes. "You exposed yourself, you hapless little maggot. Durem might be used to vampires walking the streets, but it's still not what I'd call well at ease with us."

"I've found it welcoming enough."

Mariah relaxed her posture, backing away girlishly, as if he'd just propositioned her. The smile spread wide across her face again. "Mmm," she intoned, and turned. "I think you can expect the friendly atmosphere to end in-- oh, six hours, give or take?"

Walt felt his arm muscles twinge in protest as he clinched his fist around the drawer handle. "Does this have something to do with the Myenlos?" he demanded.

"Well, mostly, it has to do with a mob of Durem's rankest scum learning where you live and the approximate contents of your bank account," she said. "From whom, I can't imagine. But no. I don't think the lead you're looking for is here, Walter."

"Then have you any suggestions as to where I ought to go instead?"

"I don't provide intelligence for free."

"Consider it an incentive for me to leave you and your 'burg' without a fuss."

"Aekea's nice," she said, in a sweet tone, and as she left Walt had already put killing her at the top of his to-do list, just beneath his search for Vivienne.