He had been staring at nothing but the coarse rusty hairs of Copperhead’s mane for the past hour, but looked up as Saun muffled an oath and kicked his tired horse into a canter. Above the Bonemarsh shore, life of a sort had returned: a flock of turkey vultures, the fingerlike fringes of their wing tips unmistakable on their black silhouettes as they wheeled. His impulse to canter after Saun was easily resisted, as neither he nor Copperhead was capable of more than a trot right now, the jolting of which would have tormented his sagging back. And…he didn’t want to look. He let his horse walk on. As they neared the south margin of the marsh, Dag straightened, squinting in guarded hope. The vultures were circling over the woods back behind the village, not over the boggy patch along the shore. Maybe they’d merely found the unburied carcasses from the mud-men’s feast. Maybe… The rest of his veiled patrol turned onto the shore track, and Dag craned his neck, heart thumping.
