They pushed off before the sky made up its mind.
Graveyard stayed behind them in pieces—low fires, slow movement, the pit a dark shape in the distance that didn't need light to exist. Whatever it was at night, it was still there in the morning. Just quieter.
David didn't turn around.
The dock gave a long, tired creak as the raft slipped free.
Water closed in around it without resistance.
The river didn't pull.
It carried.
Cole was already in place at the front, one hand on the pole, the other resting near his side. Up close, the leather on him looked worse than it had in the lantern light—cracked, stitched, repaired too many times to count. The kind of armor that stayed because the person wearing it hadn't found anything better.
Or didn't expect to.
The 10mm sat low on his hip, worn where it mattered, the grip darkened from years of use.
He didn't look back.
Didn't need to.
Jason settled near the rear of the raft, boots planted, revolver loose in his hand—not raised, not hidden. Just there.
David sat between them.
And behind him—
the trappers.
Three of them.
Quiet.
Wrapped in coats that smelled like old smoke and wet hide. One had a coil of wire traps at his feet. Another kept a rifle across his knees, fingers resting along the stock without gripping it.
They didn't talk.
Didn't look at each other.
Just rode.
"Where they getting off?" David asked.
Cole nudged the raft around a stretch of drifting scrap.
"Before the bridge."
That was all.
The bend took Graveyard out of sight.
The fog finished the rest.
The river flattened out.
Wide.
Dull.
The surface barely broke unless something touched it.
Time stretched out on the water.
Minutes stopped mattering. Then hours did too.
The only thing that changed was the light—slowly climbing, never quite reaching them through the haze.
It had been three… maybe four hours—
When the river started giving something back.
Something tapped the raft.
Soft.
David looked down.
A shape rolled just beneath the surface.
Then drifted up.
A body.
Face down.
Arms tied behind it.
Clothes pulled tight where the current dragged them.
It bumped once against the wood—
then slipped past.
No one said anything.
Another followed.
This one slower.
Turning just enough for David to catch the edge of a face before it rolled away again.
Then another.
One of the trappers shifted.
Spit over the side.
"Don't like this stretch."
Cole didn't answer.
The river moved the same.
Like it didn't care what it carried.
David watched the bodies disappear into the fog behind them.
Then looked forward again.
The shot didn't sound like a shot.
Not at first.
A dull impact.
The first trapper jerked.
Looked down.
The arrow was already there.
Buried deep in his chest.
He tried to say something.
Didn't get the chance.
He collapsed sideways against the raft, the shaft still trembling.
"Down," Jason said.
Not loud.
Didn't need to be.
The gunfire came after.
Sharp.
Close.
Wood splintered along the edge of the raft.
David dropped low, grabbing his rifle.
Movement along the bank—
shadows cutting through the fog.
Low.
Fast.
Controlled.
Not rushing.
Tracking.
Another shot—
The second trapper jerked, lost his footing—
and went over the side.
He hit the water hard.
"Grab him—"
"Leave him."
Jason didn't raise his voice.
Still didn't look at David.
The current pulled the man away from the raft before he could get a handhold.
He surfaced once, coughing, one arm dragging behind him.
Then—
the water broke.
They came up out of it.
Not from the bank.
From the river.
Bodies slick with water.
Wrapped in hides.
Faces hidden behind masks adorned with antlers.
David froze.
They didn't rush.
Didn't shout.
Didn't waste movement.
They went straight for the wounded man.
One caught him under the arm.
Another grabbed his wrist before he could reach for the raft again.
He screamed.
The sound tore across the water, sharp and sudden—
and cut through the quiet like it didn't belong there.
David saw his hand hit the side of the raft—
slide—
disappear.
They dragged him sideways, out of the current, toward the bank.
Toward the fog.
For a moment—
David could still see them.
Shapes moving.
Water breaking around them.
Antlers cutting through the haze—
Then the fog closed.
The screaming didn't last long.
Just enough to know it stopped.
The river smoothed out again.
Cole shoved the raft forward with a sharp push of the pole.
"Move."
Jason fired once toward the bank.
Not to hit.
To keep distance.
Arrows struck the water behind them.
Then further out.
Then gone.
The last trapper didn't move.
Didn't fire.
Just sat there, staring at where the man had been.
David didn't look at him.
Didn't look back at all.
The raft drifted.
The bodies were still there.
Jason broke the silence.
"They weren't after us."
Cole nodded once.
"Then what—"
"Line," Cole said.
David frowned.
Cole tapped the side of the raft once.
"Cross it, they take something back."
David looked at the water again.
At the bodies.
At the empty space beside the raft.
"…that's their warning?"
Cole didn't answer.
He didn't need to.
The smell reached them before anything else.
Smoke.
Thick.
Wrong.
Cole slowed the raft.
Jason noticed.
Looked ahead.
Shapes formed through the fog.
Still.
Structured.
Cages.
David let out a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding.
"…again."
Jason didn't argue.
Cole dropped the pole.
Checked his 10mm, sliding the magazine free and seating it again with a practiced motion.
"How many."
"Seven," David said.
Jason spun the cylinder of his revolver once.
Snapped it shut.
"No mistakes."
David looked back one last time.
At the river.
At the place where the screaming stopped.
Then forward.
The raft scraped against the bank as they desperately tried to push away.
It was to late, they noticed.