The third chime hung in the frozen air like a cracked blade.
Across the Black Silt Marshes, the silence that followed was unnatural and total.
Even the gentle lapping of the black swamp water against the rotting willow timbers of the raised stone road seemed to freeze in place. It was locked under the sudden, crushing descent of spirit pressure.
Through the torn curtain of marsh fog, the shape lunged into the lantern light with horrifying, relentless driving force.
It was a royal postal carriage, once lacquered in ritual vermilion, now rotted into a blistered, pitch-black husk.
The heavy oak body was bound with thick bands of rusted iron that weeped dark, thick, sticky grease over the axles, sizzling faintly as it dripped into the cold gravel.
Four horses drew the conveyance.
They weren’t flesh.
