The fire by the Maze-side street barricade had died down, and the street was empty except for the slain and the scavengers. Now and then someone passed by-a Stepson on one of their fierce horses, or a random member of some Nisi death squad, or one of Jubal's people just slipped out of the blue on business. No one noticed the grimy street idiot, sitting blank-eyed beside a trampled corpse; much less the sooty raven perched on a charred wagon and eyeing the same corpse, and the younger, arrow-shot one it lay on, with a cold and interested eye. Black birds were no unusual sight in Sanctuary these days.

"His soul's gone," Mriga whispered to the bird. "Long gone, and the poor body's cold. How? We came straight away-"

"Time here and there run differently," said the raven, voice hoarse and soft. "We might have done something while the tie between soul and body was still stretching thin. But it's too late now-"

"No," Mriga said.

"I should have leveled this place the last time I was here. This would never have happened!"

"Siveni, be still." Mriga sat by Harran's crushed remains, one hand stretched out to the awful ruin of his head; a purposeful gesture, for without actually touching the cold stiff flesh, she found herself unable to believe in death. That was one of the problems with being a god. Immortal, they often found it hard to take death seriously. But Mriga was taking it very seriously indeed.

She strained for omniscience; it obliged her a little. "We could get him back," she said. "There are ways...."

"And put him where? Back in this?" In her raven form, Siveni flapped down to the cold stiff mess of shattered bones and pulped muscle, and poked it scornfully with her beak. It didn't even bleed. "And if not here, where?"

"Another body? ..."

"Whose?"

Mriga's omniscience declined an answer. This didn't matter: she was getting an idea of her own ... one that scared her, but might work. "Let's not worry about it right now," she said. "We'll think of something."

"And even if we do ... who's to say his soul's survived what happened to him? Mortal souls are fragile. Sometimes death shatters them completely. Or for a long time ... long enough that by the time they've put themselves back together, it's no good putting them in a body; they've forgotten how to stay in one."

"He was a god for a little while," Mriga said. "That should count for something. And I don't think Harran was that fragile. Come on, Siveni, we have to try!"

"I'd sooner just burn the city down," the raven said, hopping and flapping up onto Mriga's shoulder as she stood up.

"A bit late for that, I fear." Mriga looked around her at the smoldering barricade, the scorched and soot-blackened faces of the surrounding buildings. "The cats have been busy setting one another's tails on fire, and not much caring what else catches and goes up as they run around screeching."

"Cats ..." Siveni said, sounding thoughtful.

"Yes: my thought exactly. We'll deal with one or two of them before we're done. But first things first. Where's my puppy?"

Tyr woke up with the upset feeling that usually meant she'd had a dream of the bad old days before the Presence came. But by the time she was fully awake, she had already realized that this time the feeling had nothing to do with any dream. For a few minutes that part of Sanctuary slammed its windows shut against the bitter howling that emanated from the garbage heap behind the Vulgar Unicorn. Tyr's throat was sore, though, with smoke and her long crying the day before, so that she coughed and retched and had to stop.

She lay there panting, deep in griefs apathy, not knowing it, not caring. The garbage all around her smelled wonderful, and she had no appetite for it. Inside the Unicorn there was the sound of people moving around, and from upstairs a cat wailed an enraged challenge, and Tyr couldn't even summon up the energy to get up and run away. She made a sound half whimper, half moan, and behind it a feeling that a human looking through her mind would instantly have recognized as a hopeless prayer. Oh, whatever there is that listens, please, please, make it didn't happen!....

... and suddenly there was someone there beside her, and old reflex took over. Tyr struggled to her feet, ready to run. But her nose countermanded her legs, and Tyr froze-then leaped up, whining madly, bouncing in a frenzy of relief, licking at the skinny figure that was crouched down next to her. The skinny one tasted better than usual. There was something else with her-a black bird of the kind Tyr usually liked to chase-but somehow the bird also smelled like the skinny one, so she let it be. She crowded into the skinny shape's arms, whimpering incredulous welcome, terror, reawakened hunger, sorrow and loss, the news of the world turned upside down ...

"I know, I know," Mriga said, and though the words meant nothing to Tyr, the dog was comforted. Mriga knew exactly how she felt, without omniscience being involved. Her own retarded mind, before the onslaught of divinity, had been the same nounless void, full of inexplicable presences and influences. Now the dog nosed at her, both vastly relieved and freshly wounded by the reminder of what was wrong with the world. She whimpered, and her stomach growled.

"Oh, poor child," Mriga said, and reached sideways into timelessness for the rib bones she'd been working on. Tyr leaped at the half-rack of ribs almost before they were entirely into time, and fell to gnawing on them.

"She thinks she's in hell," Mriga said to Siveni.

The raven laughed, one harsh bitter caw. "Would that she were, for he's certainly there. She could lead us to him...."

Mriga looked at the raven in swift admiration. "That lost wisdom's coming back to you, sister. So she might. Of course, we would have to find a way to get into hell ourselves."

"Then think of one," Siveni said, sounding both pleased and annoyed.

Mriga thought. Her omniscience stirred, though not precisely in the direction required. "I don't know how just yet," she said. "But there are experts in this town ... people who know the way. They've sent so many others down that road. And they bring them back again."

Tyr looked up and yipped. She had been bolting the meat and already looked somewhat better-not just from having eaten after a long fast. The food and drink of the gods work strangely in mortals. Tyr's eyes were already brighter and deeper than Mriga ever remembered having seen them; and the dog had abruptly stopped smelling like a garbage-heap.

"Yes," Mriga said. "It might just work. Finish that, little one. Then we'll go down by the White Foal ... and go to hell."

Tyr yipped again and went at the ribs with dispatch. The raven looked sidewise at Mriga. "What if she won't help us?" she said.

Omniscience spoke up again, and Mriga frowned, for it was no comfort. "She will," she said. "Always assuming that between here and there, we can figure out the right things to say...."

Even necromants need to sleep occasionally, and in the last few days Ischade had gotten less sleep than usual. Now, in this bright chill winter afternoon she had evidently counted Sanctuary deep enough in shock at its troubles that she might rest a little while. The shutters of the house by the White Foal were all closed. What black birds sat in the trees did so with heads under wing, mirroring their mistress. There was no sound there but the rattling of dry leaves and withered rose-hips in the thorny hedge.

"This place smells like death," said the raven perched on the shoulder of the skinny, ragged girl who stood by the little wicket gate.