Ears ringing, I y on the ground, the dirt rh underh me as I groaned.

  I could remember the explosion, just as I’d begun to turn. I’d been far away but the forced must have shoved me to the ground. I turned etting me hands underh me. Dust swirled around me, and the pacted surface of the crappy road broke up the explosive force that rocked it. The interse the wagon had been at was still covered, filled only by dust. No screaming. No sounds at all actually, even as I dragged myself an agonizing foot.

  I tried to get up. Pain immediately sent me back to the ground. The force had broken my splint, the metal rod snapped in half on one side of it’s u-shaped design. My broken leg sent pure agony up my leg. I gave up to move it, instead crawling towards where the side of the road must be.

  It was slow going, not helped by what was scattered across the road. Nails, a mixture of rusted and pristine scattered about. Whoever had set off the bomb had included their own, nasty shrapnel into the mix, and I thanked whatever devils or other things might be watg me that none of them had struck me.

  Someoouched my shoulder and my ha for my revolver, drawing it as I rolled onto my back.

  Above me Varrow hurriedly backed off, saying something I couldn’t hear.

  “I ’t hear you,” I said, pointing at my ears with my free hand as I put my revolver bato my coat.

  He frowhen poi his own, scowl deepening.

  Hopefully that would e back. It wouldn’t be as good as it was before, not until I examihe middle ear bones and see if I could repair the damage undoubtedly done. I had a potion, but using that would be...it probably was the best choice. Leg first, though.

  I tapped the thigh of my broken leg and immediately regretted it as the pain fred up again. Varrow looked down at it, nodded, and then immediately moved behind me, grabbing me under my shoulders.

  Not what I’d meant, but probably best to find somepce away from the explosion to-fug hells!

  Varrow wasn’t gentle, and I cursed futilely at him as my broken leg scraped across the dirt surface of the road. After what felt like ay of agony we reached the wall of a house before he finally let me go. I gulped air while he headed off into the settling dust before returning with the remnants of my splint.

  The u-shaped pieetal that formed the frame had been snapped, which essentially made it poio try and repair. Best we could do is sge some wood for a temporary one. I shook my head at a waiting Varrow, then rapped my knuckles on the wood wall o me, prying a little at a pnk with my fingers. He hen started to work on it.

  Property damage, but as my entire body ached, I couldn’t really force myself to care about that.

  While Varrow worked oing a pnk free of the building, I had nothing but time to think while my body ached over the test series of injuries doo it. The hells had that been?

  I was not nearly full of myself to think that had been directed at me, even if I had been tracked. Set off too far from me, far too indiscriminate of a on. Aire wagon of gunpht not be the worst on to use on a Diabolist, but it is hardly the best targeted. No, this was a random attack aimed at the marchers, but clearly without care if anyone in the Quarter was killed as well.

  There was another expnation for who in the Quarter had the resources to pull off something like that, but why Versalicci would want this…..maybe. If he wahe pressure in the Quarter ratcheted up, back to when his anization had it’s heyday. Drive the entire quarter to desperation so his numbers of recruits could soar like they had back when I’d been part of it. All he o do is make it look like what was already expected of us Infernals had occurred.

  That expnation made increasingly more sehe more I thought on it. That was a motivation, uhe Shapegers, who I couldn’t think of a reason for doing this. There was also the possibility of a third party, but I dismissed that idea. Without additional information, specution would just lead to nowhere useful.

  Varrow had finished ripping the board off the house, and I began w on cutting strips out of my coat. Another one ruined. I should just start bringing random strips of cloth around at all times. Tightening it made the pain worse but I could actually get bay hoof. With that done, I pulled a small bottle from my coat.

  I drank half before passing it to Varrow, an itg building in my ears before, with a sudden pop, ambient sounds returned.

  “You couldn’t have dohat at the start?” Varrow asked, his voice a bit tinny in my ears as they itched.

  “Do I look like I’m made of money?” I replied. “Believe it or not, Dawes keeps a very tight leash on what I’m allowed to requisition, and I wao make sure I could get ba this leg before splitting it.”

  I stepped away from the support of the wall. My head swam, and more than my leg ached. I didn’t have nails in me, right? I didn’t think so, but I’d taken a litany of smaller injuries each g out for me to rest.

  Between this and the party, I might insist on having aire week where I did nothing but y down, read, aea. The thought of that was entrang enough it almost drew me away from reality.

  Unluckily, the pain was there t me back. Each step brought fresh agony as I walked towards where the wagon had been.

  Still I headed for the wagon, towards what had once been one of the Quarter’s major roads. Which meant it actually had cobbles, although those had been blown all about by the bst. How many barrels of gunpowder has bee on this? Guessing from the number of buildings with their fronts colpsed in on themselves, more than enough.

  “Harrow, what are you doing? We o leave before more people arrive.”

  A good point. But curiosity won out, mainly because where was everyohe overall silence had remained even after my hearing had been fixed.

  “I want to take a look,” I said. “Make sure of a few things.”

  “We’re going to be knee-deep in those marchers in a sed,” he hissed at me. “And if not them, Watch looking for someoo bme.”

  “True. Just a quick look. Theer at your pce, maybe?”

  “Too risky. Your new pce.”

  “I’ll see what I do,” I said as I finally made it to the area of the explosion.

  Bodies were scattered about. Broken in many ways, burnt, nails protruding out of skin. Mostly marchers and watch, I noted ically as the dust settled. Infernals had been oer edges, so there were less bodies. More streaks of blood, probably from people who’d ran, crawled, or limped away from the age. No one here seemed to be among the living, so I ighe scattered limbs and broken corpses as I headed for the source of the bst.

  Less bodies here, most of them flung away by the force of the explosion. Those that were left were the worst off, taking the full force of the explosion. And the full force of the metal shards and scraps packed in as shrapnel. I found one of the drivers of the neighb carts dead. The only mercy is it might have been quick given the wood puncturing the side of his head, brains leading out around the hole.

  Where the wagon had been there was not a scrap of wood left, but there was something blown into the dirt, a pattern marring the cobbles of the Quarter’s main thhfare. A Fming Goat’s head.

  Probably not Versalicci then. He would want the Quarter under pressure, but anything that would direct attention on him wouldn’t be good for him. Making himself more of a nuisance was a recipe for the army being brought bato the capital to root him out. He wasn’t suicidal. This art of the ger plot, but why?

  The involvement of Infernals as their scapegoats, I’d assumed it had just been because we’d make easy ones for them, but was there another reason? Because this targeti deliberate and beyond the scope of their earlier as.

  I checked the residue f the symbol. Ash mixed with grease was my best guess after toug and feeling it. There was no magic of any kind in the symbol itself, and the ck of any magic was ann pointing away from the Bck Fme. You didn’t stick around to do dumb stunts like this with Versalicci, assuming he’d even want a signature on a job like this.

  This was stra was almost as if framing the Bck Fme was as mue of their goals as whatever they wanted out of Lord Montague, but what? I hadn’t been with the Fme in five years and I’d never knowhing Versalicci did, but there was absolutely nothing I could think of that would involve shapegers with the Fme.

  I was cheg for corpses for the two Infernals I’d spotted getting off the wagon before it exploded. Although, even ating for potential shape-gers, it wasn’t that easy I thought as I leaned by one corpse. The right skin color, but the explosion had make identification a bit of trouble I thought as I pulled the head up by the few scraps of hair still on her head. A few shreds of skin remained on, the rest shredded off by the nails. Guessing from her lying face-down in a pool of her own blood with a severed spine? Not a quick death.

  Varrow was cheg some of the bodies now and I hoped no one else stumbled upon us. Old habits died hard, but the st thing I needed was getting into a scuffle with the watch over his sticky fingers.

  “Could you not for a few minutes? Watch will be here eventually.”

  “They aren’t here yet,” Varrow said, a scowl ing across his face. “Actually that’s a bit off.”

  He wasn’t wron-

  The earth rocked with a thunderous roar, and I barely kept my footing. My head swiveled about till it spotted another plume of dust going skyward, bits of wreckage flung out from the exploision.

  No. Hells damn them, no!

  Varroale as he began to move towards one of the streets. The ground shook again.

  They’d burire district down tonight if they could. Assuming enough of them survived. I moved after Varrow as fast as I could, leg throbbing with every step. First things first, get out of here. Take Varrow with me, and if either Dawes ashin protested I’d see if I could fix them up with some fake horns and red skioss them in here for a night.

  The swirling dust had settled entirely now, revealing further down the road on both ends. Empty. Strange. Where was everyone? Run perhaps? With the time taken to get the splint ihere should have been more than enough time for them to do so. But the idea that the Watch would desert their posts at a time like this was...troubling.

  The earth shook again. I hurried after Varrow, limping as quickly as possible before he got too far ahead. Hopefully, we make it out of the Quarter.