The Ugly Possum Saloon was a pretty standard-fare tavern. Even before we walked in through the swinging half doors, we were greeted by a jaunty piano rendition of “The Wrangler’s Lament.” Deebo used to love that song, though he preferred it on a fiddle. Whoever was playing this one was skilled. Their hands were flying across the keys. That is, unless it was one of them automatic pianos from back East that played pre-recorded songs. I didn’t know how the machines worked at all, but I doubted a small town like Barrowdown would have something that fancy. Sure enough, I was right.

  My assumption was validated as soon as we entered the main room of the saloon. It was large and open with a stage to the left where the piano player sat. A pale woman in a poofy green dress tickled the ivories, her blonde hair made up in an elaborate pattern, ringlets hanging around her ears and jaw.

  A few other women in bright-colored corsets and skirts lounged on the upstairs balcony, leaning from the railing as they fanned themselves with lace and silk fans, burly men flirting at their sides. Beneath the balcony was an elaborate bar with a mirrored wall lined with shelves and covered in bottles of fine drink. It was nicer than I had expected.

  The clientele, on the other hand, wasn’t nearly as nice as the saloon might have suggested. It was a bunch of grimy men with coal-darkened faces and soot-stained clothes. They sang and drank and laughed, but I didn’t sense the twinge of violence in the air that a lot of saloons cultivated. That didn’t mean that it couldn’t be set off at the drop of a hat.

  My vision was suddenly overcome by a barrage of new card info from everyone. A lot of them had their sleeves rolled up, and most of the women had arms and shoulders bare. No one was devoid of ink. Ten cards, twenty, more. It overwhelmed me, and I had to squeeze my eyes shut for a moment to keep my head from spinning. I’d read about this before, that initial overwhelming feeling when you saw a large crowd of people with exposed card tattoos. It wasn’t pleasant, but I knew it would get easier to ignore the more experienced I got.

  Nell seemed to notice this. She slung an arm around my shoulders and guided me to a corner booth on the opposite wall from the piano. The red leather seat was in need of some polishing and a patch where some rips had begun to grow, but it was comfy.

  We ordered a gourd of cactus wine to share, plus a bowl of sugar bark if we wanted to add it to the wine to make it even sweeter. Nell ordered a simple iguana-and-vegetable stew, but I needed a bit more substance, so I ordered a platter of boiled scorpions. It was a delicacy, and I loved it.

  “Remember when you, me, Gareth, and Pearla had a scorpion platter for dinner, and those merchants from the capital who were passing through saw us?” I asked her after the barmaid left our table with our orders.

  Nell laughed. “Yeah, that poor man just about lost his lunch. I’m surprised he kept it down. Easties don’t eat anything fun. It’s all healthy and wholesome, whatever the hell that means.”

  “I don’t believe for a second that they aren’t eating monsters,” I replied. “I mean, there’s a market for it, and I know damn well someone is eating ’em. And it ain’t just us out here in the Badlands. Gotta be them. They’re the only swanky puffs flush enough to afford a rack of drake ribs.”

  “I know for a fact they do. I went to Imodia City for a bounty, farthest east I’ve ever been, and I saw a whole fancy restaurant dedicated solely to serving monster. It was after lunch but still packed. I didn’t go in though. I was broke at the time, and even if I’d had the money, I doubt they’d have let a fresh Badlands waste dog into their fine establishment.”

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  I sipped my wine, the sweet nectar rolling down my throat, and a single bead down my chin. “Well, damn. Now I’m curious.”

  “There’s a vendor in Mushyon Ridge that sells monster meat. His sons do the hunting, and he does the cooking. And he doesn’t charge an arm and a leg.”

  “Then I guess we have that to look forward to.”

  Of course, sometimes the saloons in Parroia did sell monster meat, but it was always expensive, and even when I did have the money to buy a plate, I was dubious about it. A part of me was convinced it would poison me or change me in some fundamental way. I knew that was ridiculous, but it was hard to shake the feeling.

  Our food came out soon enough. My tray of steamy red scorpions looked amazing, Fragrant clouds wafting off of them. At the piano, the player finished her song, the keys dancing into a crescendo before a deep, bassy dismount. The room erupted into applause. Then she took a break.

  We were both famished. Me especially. I didn’t know if Nell had eaten breakfast that morning, but I’d woke up with literally nothing but my clothes, so my stomach was empty and ready. The food was delicious. I mean, I’d had better, but given my lack of food and the death-defying battle in the woods, that food tasted better than anything on earth or in the heavens.

  Once I was reasonably satisfied, I leaned back, my stomach content, and sighed as I basked in the lively atmosphere. My attention turned to Nell, who had been silent as we ate, her smile subdued but constant as she enjoyed her food and the music.

  “What have you been up to these last couple years?” I asked her.

  She still had her parents, unlike me and my brother. That said, her parents hadn’t been great. Her mother couldn’t walk after a wound she suffered in a monster raid years prior, so she sat at their home at a loom making tapestries, carpets, and the like. It wasn’t the high-quality material you would find in the city, but it was good enough. Nell always was the one who took them to the market to sell. Deebo and Gareth looked out for her, as did a lot of others. Overall, she was well-liked.

  Her father, on the other hand, was a lot like Elryck and Thoman, a part-time miner and a full-time drinker. When he wasn’t drowning in his cups or choking on smog in the mines, he was berating his wife and daughter . . . or hitting them. We ought to have done something more about that, but unfortunately, abuse was not uncommon in families in the Badlands. He had his moments of being a sweet and loving father, of course. All human beings were complex. No one was simply good or bad. Still, he was a piece of work.

  The year she left, her father died in a mining accident—unfortunately, also not an uncommon occurrence—and her mother took her life in grief. I never understood why she did that, as Barret Newton was not a kind man to his wife or daughter, but I supposed love was a strange thing. There must have been times when they were happy and in love, I guess. When her husband died, she apparently couldn’t go on any longer, not with her disability and a small daughter to take care of.

  Nell and I drifted apart that year, even though Gareth and I wanted nothing more than to comfort her. Deebo even offered to take her in, but Nell instead moved in with her aunt, a widow who was kind enough but rather strict compared to her parents. After a few months, the aunt took Nell away to somewhere in the east to get a better education. It seemed some of that took, but now she was a hunter of men and monsters alike, and I doubted that was what the aunt had had in mind.

  Regardless, I was glad Nell was with me now.

  She spooned some of her stew into her mouth. “I hunt. I gather bounties. I use those earnings to eat and live. I live a Badlands life. Same as before, just a different occupation.”

  I clasped my hands together in front of me. “You know what I mean. How long have you been a hunter? What happened to your aunt? What did you do after you left? It’s been two and a half years, approaching three. That’s a long time.”

  It became clear to me that this was not a subject she was excited to discuss. What smile she’d had for the food and the singing suddenly vanished. Her emotions left her with haste, her eyes becoming portals into a painful memory. One I couldn’t possibly see, and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to.

  “It didn’t work out. We moved to the east for a time. Azalea. A pretty town. Near the Great Pine Woods. It’s no eastie city, but it’s bigger than Parroia and most towns in the Badlands. Honestly, I did like it, but I missed home. Missed you and Gareth and Deebo and everyone else. But I went to school, learned a lot, took up a weaving apprenticeship, made some friends, had three steady meals a day.”

  I frowned. “Then what went wrong? Why are you here and not there?”