08/25/2025 Snippet, BANSHEE BEACH.

Now is the time where more bodies must hit the floor. Or, well, sand.

…

Blood on the sand. A bunch more stuff, too, but the blood’s the first thing you’ll notice. It clumps up, and doesn’t vanish as it dries. There isn’t as much smell as you’d think, though. Guess the seaweed and salt give the iron a run for its money.

Lucas and I, we aimed for the cops. They were standing around in one of the classic loiters, the kind where you clump up and glare at the onlookers. This being Maravilloso, the onlookers were glaring right back. The scene wasn’t ugly, but it wasn’t gonna win any concursos, either. Hopefully we could wrap our part of it before the obligatory rumble.

The body was covered with a tarp. Tarps. There were three, and not one of them was closer than a foot to any of the others. I could feel Lucas narrowing his eyes at that as we walked up. “I didn’t know you had those kinds of monsters here, Tom,” he muttered at me.

“We don’t,” I muttered back. “Not for long. Okay, here comes the dumbest cop. He’s gonna be a hands-on kind of jackass. Let him.”

Whaddya know? I was right. Dumb Cop started right off with the classic hand-on-chest-and-shove. “Back off, tourist! Nothing to see, here!”

Tourist? We needed to get a full-time Shamus down here, right away. Or maybe a Loremaster or too. Whatever they were teaching the locals in school wasn’t taking. “Hey, Sergeant!” I yelled past him. “This an official beat-it, or is this guy just bored?”

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