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absence of scars still strange to her senses, while the pale shadows of a hundred past scars calmed her self-conscious musings.
    She drew a dagger from her belt and walked toward the dark forest, no longer able to resist the pull of so many faded heartbeats, so many bright yet lifeless eyes, so many children born of plague-emptied villages, waiting among the twisted trees.

CHAPTER THREE
    Evening approached, bringing more dark gray clouds. Birds began searching for steadier perches in the strong winds that rolled in from the Lake of Steam. A humid mist hung over the tall grass growing tenaciously on the hill between sea and forest, its mass interrupted only by the worn cart path that led to the town gates.
    The mist shifted slightly, rolling in on itself, swirling in ephemeral drafts as a faint figure appeared in its depths. It was tall, this silhouette materializing in the agitated mist, a shadow taking form among shadows. He was wrapped in a gray cloak with a high collar and wore a long-used, wide-brimmed traveler’s hat.
    The spinning haze settled and revealed fair skin, a graceful jawline, silvered blond hair, and the light armor of a quick-footed warrior.
    Reflexively, Quinsareth hid his pale eyes beneath the brim of his hat, never sure who might be present as he arrived from the phantom roads of the shadowalk. He stopped for a moment, allowing the icy chill to fade from his body, letting the gravity of the dirt road settle into his stiff muscles, and clearing his mind of the discordant voices that echoed in the Shadow Fringe. As his eyes adjusted, he saw that the mass of blurred darkness he’d seen was the ocean. Its appearance in the shadowalk had been hauntingly beautiful, a black velvet blanket of absolute nothing.
    Quinsareth pulled the plated leather gauntlet from his right forearm and reached beneath his collar to trace the thin, jagged scar from Vesk’s knife. It was tender but closed and healing quickly now, a benefit of the shadowalk’s swift corridors.
    The moisture in the air chilled him, driven by cool gusts of wind. He pulled his cloak tighter across his shoulders and surveyed his surroundings. He spotted the crude stone walls of the small town before him, noting the closed gates though it was barely sunset, or seemed so from the faint light illuminating the heavy clouds overhead. A signpost identified the town ahead as Logfell. A raven perching on the sign eyed him suspiciously, its wings raised.
    Quinsareth replaced his gauntlet as he studied the town, something alarming him, triggering the abstract senses of his celestial blood and stirring the restless darkness in the pit of his stomach. He absently patted the scabbard of the slumbering Bedlam at his side. Although not truly asleep, the blade’s magic lay inert and silent, allowing him a measure of stealth as he approached the gates.
    The raven leaped into flight, flapping quickly against the wind and disappearing over the wall. No smoke curled from the chimneys beyond the low stone wall—a strange detail in a region where autumn was brief and winters brought more rain than snow or ice. In the early chill of the current season, Quinsareth expected warm fireplaces among those unaccustomed to such cold winds.
    Standing before the wide gates, their surfaces eroded by years of exposure to the Lake of Steam’s briny moisture, he could smell the familiar stench of death. Its aroma barely touched the air, but it confirmed his growing suspicions. As he laid his hand upon the wood, a hundred scenarios played through his mind, none of them worrisome. He had no expectation of a warm reception, or even of a peaceful street scene painted with curious onlookers. Those of his ilk rarely arrived in time to wield blade and will against injustice before harm was done. Like a scavenger to carrion, the ghostwalker came to balance the scales.
    Quin banished all thought of what might be, emptying his mind to be filled with what would be. He had no liking for practiced