The bodies of the men and women that decorated the buildings and streets didn't spook Azrael's horse any more than they spooked him. Nothing had spooked it since he'd raised it from the dead. The horses of the men with him, on the other hand, were as skittish as if they smelled hellspawn on the wind. Maybe they did. But Azrael reckoned it was more likely the opposite of hellspawn that had done this.

"Cold," our guide said to me, maybe the one word of my language he knew. Behind us, a wave crashed against the Stones' boundary, the water sizzling and shrieking at the contact. None of the Kriegsflotte crewmen reacted. They were, somehow, used to this. In the night, I knew that demons, corporeal manifestations of the Out, swam all around. Only with these treacherous Kriegsflotte or in Jani's care could I navigate such regions.