Quincannon gunned the motor, and drove south. To the west, the sun was rapidly sinking, turning the sands the colour of blood. Tyree slumped in her seat, trying to forget Elder Seth's eyes, trying to ignore the urge to join him in his mad march.
They'd had to sedate Yorke again. His watery, empty eyes suggested permanent trauma. Tyree thought the kid was as dead as Burnside. Fifty per cent casualties on this patrol. Not good.
The Quince took something down from his rooflocker. A bottle of Shochaiku Double-Blend. He twisted off the top and drank from the neck, then passed it to her.
"I was nearly one of them. Quince."
"I know. The way I figure it, Elder Seth was painting the road with blood, as a marker for something."
She took a swig of the booze, and felt warmth in her stomach. In the back, Yorke shifted, crying out in his sleep. She held the bottle.
"There were invisible things …"
"Don't think, Leona."
Quincannon picked something up off the floor. A piece of paper. It must have fallen from the locker. Tyree craned her neck, trying to get a look, but couldn't. Quincannon rolled his window down a crack, and threw the paper out. It was whipped away in the air, and lost in the desert.
She swallowed whiskey, focusing on the burn in her gullet. She could not not think.
Outside, full night had fallen and the Des was dark. Quincannon gunned the cruiser into the visibility funnel of its headlights.
"Goodbye, Marilyn," he said, almost under his breath.