Len Vey walked slowly across the bloodstained sawdust of the forge shop floor, his boots making a soft, crunching sound as the leather soles pressed into the fine gray powder that had drifted inward from the threshold.
The air in the workshop had grown piercingly cold. Without the nonstop spark hum of the Tram anchor streaming warmth through the underground channels, the natural damp of the flooded valley was reasserting itself. The sulfur mist that drifted through the open door carried the sharp, icy bite of November frost, condensing in tiny, glittering beads along the iron barrel of Bram’s holstered revolver and coating the cold brickwork of the forge in slick moisture.
Len stopped at the door doorstep. He lowered the shuttered brass lantern until the yellow beam lit up the mound of fallen fabric between his boots.
The dark woolen sweater lay flattened against the oak threshold, its sleeves twisted and empty, the collar hollowed out where the creature’s neck had crumbled. Draped across the wool was the white linen apron.
The apron was astonishing in its cleanliness. In a ward where every piece of cloth was stained with coal smoke, machine grease, or turnip broth, this linen remained as white and flawless as freshly carded wool. Its hem was pressed, its pocket seams straight, untouched by a single drop of grease or wood ash. It was a relic of a world before the darkness. The clean apron of a master baker who worked in morning sunlight.
