Back in the guard station. One of the women gasped at the sight of the corpses, but I was sure there was no love lost. The middle-aged one might have even chuckled, I thought.

The room smelled like vomit and blood. Both were my fault, I supposed.

I approached one of the dead Kalamuzi. The one that wasn’t a Talker. I didn’t want to step into that moral dilemma.

“Hand me your knife,” I said to Lot, holding out my hand.

He was behind me, so I didn’t see the expression he made, but he hesitated. “What are you going to do, Miles?” It almost sounded like fear in his voice, which made me want to laugh.

“I’m going to make a disguise, what else? Hurry up and hand me the knife, unless you think you could do it faster.”

He probably could, but he didn’t volunteer. I supposed I could understand why. I could practically hear him shudder, could feel it in the atmosphere around us, but he handed me the knife.

“Ladies,” he said. “I suggest you look away. I believe my companion is about to make a mess, and if my guess is correct, it’s going to be quite grotesque.”

I didn’t wait for their go-ahead. I began cutting, happy to find the blade sharp, reminding myself all the while that there wasn’t anything weird about it, that it was completely normal. It was like skinning a deer, or a rabbit, or a fox. An animal. Just an animal. People do it all the time.

This is good, actually, I thought to myself. I’m like one of the native Americans, using every part of the buffalo. It would be a waste to just leave it here. I should eat it, really. Seriously. I should make the bones into jewelry and throw the meat into a stew. But it probably tastes terrible, and, honestly, I don’t have the time. But I’m not going to feel bad about slicing it up just because it walks around on two legs. There are people back on Earth who eat monkey. I’d feel worse about that than this. Monkeys are cute, at least. Sometimes. These fuckers aren’t cute at all.

In fact, it was better than that, I told myself. This was a monster. It deserved everything I gave it. I could have tortured it for weeks and it still wouldn’t have evened out the karmic debt this creature had accrued, raping and pillaging and slaving and murdering. And I killed it, which was only right. It didn’t have a soul, not any more than a rat had a soul - but on the off chance that it did, it was burning in hell.

Fuck you. I thought as I carved, tapping into my hatred of the Kalamuzi - and other hates. It helped the process along. Fuck you all. You all deserve it, and worse. I’ll wear your fucking skin, and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.

In the interest of time, I didn’t skin the whole carcass. I started by scalping it - what a terrible word to use, why did I have to think that - and I went slowly there, careful to keep the face, and especially the nose, as intact as I possibly could. From there, continuing the one piece of skin, I got the shoulders, the arms and hands, and then I gave up somewhere down the torso. First of all, because I wanted no part in performing a Kalamuzi castration. Second of all, time was of the essence. Besides, I’d already demonstrated that the ratmen didn’t pay the closest of attention. My lower half would be covered, and I wasn’t expecting to be frisked.

It ended up being like a cloak, as I left most of the front open below the snout. I didn’t want to be literally wearing a suit of skin if I could help it.

It reminded me of those hats that girls in highschool used to wear, with long ears that you could put your hands in to keep warm.

Lot was right, I thought. This is grotesque.

I held up my finished work. It was bloody, hairy, smelled like death, and, honestly, I hadn’t done that good of a job. It looked terrible. I suppose you could say that it was far outside my realm of expertise, but if you pressed me, I wasn’t sure I could tell you what my realm of expertise was, exactly, besides parasitism and mimicry. Hatred, I supposed. Hatred was my new wheelhouse. It was getting me to some strange places, already.

First I took off my dress - I couldn’t imagine a Kalamuzi wearing that. I had my old clothes on underneath, and after everything I had been through, they were dirty enough that they could pass as Kalamuzi clothes just fine. I used the dress to try and mop up the blood on my pelt, and it kind of worked.

I lifted the pelt over my head, then realized that the wig was going to get in the way. Still not wanting to waste any time, I used Lot’s knife to cut my own hair just below where it fed into the wig. It meant losing a little hair, but I needed a haircut anyway.

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I put the skin on, and it felt wet and sticky and all around absolutely awful. I turned back to Lot. “What do you think?”

One of them women had snuck a peak, and almost immediately vomited.

“I think I feel fairly similar to how she feels” Lot said.

“Do I look like a Kalamuzi?”

“About as much as you looked like a woman.”

“Well that’s perfect then,” I said. “Because the last disguise worked, didn’t it?”

“Except that Kalamuzi see a lot more Kalamuzi than they do human women.”

I frowned. “You think they’ll notice.”

“If I say yes, will it have any effect on your… momentum, did you call it?”

“No.”

“Then I suppose I will have to take the lead,” Lot said. “Pull a hood over your head, wrap a cloak up tight beneath your chin, and stay behind me.”

“Hold up,” I said. I had had another thought. Mercury… I walked over to where the guards had kept those potions, the ones that looks like mercury.

I popped the cork off of one of the bottles, and the smell nearly knocked me out, a thick smell. Like ethanol, I thought.

First, I poured out a little bit on the floor. It sounded almost like it sizzled, and my stomach started to hurt just thinking about that. Now that there was air inside the bottle - after all, fire needs oxygen, right? - I took a nail from out of my pocket and dropped it it. I corked it again, thinking. If it was just flammable, then lighting it would just make a fire in the bottle, and not do much else. For a molotov to work, it has to break.

But if it was explosive…

I was pretty sure that mercury wasn’t flammable, normally, but I wasn’t sure that the stuff was actually mercury. And I thought I remembered watching an old TV show where the main character used some kind of mercury to make an explosion. Maybe. It was called like, culminated mercury, or something. I don’t know. It was worth a shot.

“You know Miles,” Lot said as I carried what I hoped was a weapon into the hallway, setting it down what was hopefully a safe distance away. “You are a frightening man, at times.”

“That says more about society than it does about me,” I said.

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t worry about it. Now everyone back away. Hopefully I’m about to make another mess.”

They all listened, the women now not sure whether they were more scared of me or Lot, clearly. You could read it on their faces. He was a Kalamuzi, but I was crazy. That’s what they were thinking.

I reached out for the strings, and was happy to find them just as responsive as ever. I took a deep breath, and sent out a shot of mana.

An explosion rocked the room. Gore and trash flew from the hallway. Everyone was yelling, but it took me a long time to notice, because my ears were ringing. And the room was brighter than it had been. I realized that I had started a fire.

But I was smiling. I had just made a bomb. Remote-detonated bomb.

I’m sure the smile didn’t help convince the women I wasn’t crazy.

I motioned to Lot that it was time to go. After all, someone probably heard that. But first, I took my pack back from Lot, and I filled it full of those potions.

-

The way to the fork Lot had talked about was actually fairly uneventful.

First we had hurriedly piled the bodies in the hallway, which was now smoking, half-collapsed, and nearly blocked off. The prisoners girls didn’t help - worthless. Then, on our way out, I set off another bomb. I didn’t stay to see what effect it had, but I hoped it would slow the ratmen down who came to investigate.

And they did come. We were out of the room just in time so that no one saw us leave, but soon a group of Kalamuzi - a few Talkers among them - came rushing past.

We got some looks, but Lot’s story held up. Behind us, I had just barely heard a Talker yelling something like “again?! Stupid fucking idiots.”

Before long, we were in another crimson passageway, alone, standing before the split. Then something Lot had said before hit me.

“Earlier,” I said. “You said you were taking the women out. You aren’t coming with me?”

He shook his head. “It is impossible. You’re going to die if you fight Olsgolon.” He held up a hand. “Now it’s my turn to tell you to stop and listen. I am not trying to convince you. You will go with or without me, I know. But these women don’t deserve to die. I can bring them out. That is meaningful, Miles. That is the sort of vengeance that I owe my mother.”

My mouth opened, but no words came out. Lot began talking again.

“I wouldn’t do you any good, anyway,” he said. “Olsgolon is like, like a…” He shook his head. “I cannot rightly describe it to you. But I couldn’t fight her. No matter what my feelings are, she has a hold on me, on all of us. I’d be just as likely to defend her as fight her.”

I sighed. I could see immediately that there was no use trying to talk him out of the idea, and I didn’t have the time to argue. I didn’t need him anymore. I’d do it myself. “Fine. If that’s how it has to be. Tell me how to go the rest of the way. I don’t have much time.”

He did. First he handed me back Naomi’s staff. Then we squatted down, and he drew a little map in the dust. I committed the route to memory, as well as the way out that we had already discussed.

“There’s another route,” Lot said, pointing. “Past Olsgolon’s chamber. It loops back around to where we’ll be. We will wait for you, for a time. If you actually manage to-”

“I will,” I said.

“Then take that route. But if you come to your senses…”

“Don’t worry,” I said, standing, smiling beneath the Kalamuzi nose. “There’s no risk of that.”

Lot laughed and stood as well. “I’ve only known you a short time, Miles,” he said. “But I daresay you are right. I envy your courage.”

I joined his laughing. “Envy? Me? That’s a first.”

“I find that hard to believe.” Lot stuck out his hand. “We’ll be waiting, but eventually we’ll have to leave without you. I hope I see you again.”

I took his hand. “Good luck,” I said. “Get these women out of here.”

“Don’t die, Miles,” Lot said, suddenly serious. “You’re the best person I’ve met in my life, since my mother died. The world would be worse off without you.”

I laughed again. “If I’m the best person you’ve ever met, you need to get out more.”

“Um, excuse me?” The middle-aged woman was talking. The other two girls weer cowering behind her. “Did you say we’re going with *ahem* with him?” She motioned to Lot.

“You have a problem with that?” I asked.

“Of course I have a problem with that,” she said, hands on her hips. “You think I trust a Kalamuzi to get me out of here?”

“He’s only a quarter Kalamuzi,” I said. “He’s mostly human. Besides, what’s your alternative? Would you rather come with me? I’m going to go fight Olsgolon.”

It was clear from the face she made that she did not want to do that, either. The woman looked at Lot sideways.

“I just want to help,” Lot said. “My mother was in the position you’re in. She died in the prison.”

The woman scrunched up her face.

“Look,” I said. “I’ve got shit to do. Go with him, don’t, it doesn’t matter to me. But I’m leaving. If you want to live, go with Lot.”

I turned to the path. I could hear some bickering continue behind me, as well as one of the girls crying out after me, asking me not to go. But I ignored all of that. They would follow Lot. What else could they do?

I had more important things on my mind.

I turned back, talking over my shoulder. “Hey Lot. One last thing.”

“What is it?” he said.

“Any advice for killing Olsgolon?”

“Crack the core,” he said. “You’ll have to get past the bodies and treasure, but the core underneath is Olsgolon herself. If you don’t break that, she won’t die.”

“And how do I get down to the core?”

He laughed again. “You could try burning it.”

I chuckled. “Sounds like a plan.”