weeping woman bumps into me, knocking me over. I land face-to-face with a corpse, staring at Colonel Macanthos’s scar. Silver blood trickles down her face, from her forehead to the floor. The bullet hole is strange, surrounded by gray, rocky flesh. She was a stoneskin. She was alive long enough to try and stop it, to shield herself. But the bullet couldn’t be stopped. She still died. I push back from the murdered woman, but my hands slide through a mixture of silverblood and wine. A scream escapes me in a terrifying combination of frustration and grief. The blood clings to my hands, like it
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