Night cloaked the city. A whisper of a breeze flushed the warmth from the stone cathedral. A lady was getting married and guests in formal attire filled the plaza, gas lamps lighting their procession. Alistair's claws gripped the stone ledge as the tower clock reverberated. Midnight had arrived and the wedding party filed inside, all but one.

The morning light forced its way through the film of grease coating the windows of the potting shed turned artificers' shop. Clarissa left the door open to air out the taste of motor oil hanging in the air. She guided a broken automaton to her worktable, limping from a bent piston and sparking from frayed circuits.

Casey's hair coiled in the damp air. Clouds hung low over the brick shops, bustling with patrons. Her territory. The merchants permitted her weirding shop, because she kept creatures like the winged serpent away. Yet, on this dull gray morning, he just happened to walk down her street, jade scales glistening in the dim light.

Breaux Manor loomed over Bourbon Street for two centuries before Zula discovered it at auction. Abandoned for over a decade, cracks spider webbed its windows, and smoke swirled behind them as if a perpetual fire raged within.

The blackened trees creaked and moaned. Silhouettes of a forgotten forest against the soft white landscape. Kalada could almost imagine snow had fallen to ease the smoldering pulp and quieten its suffering, but for the powder puffing up in clouds beneath her leather boots.

Shadows snapped against the stone walls behind the frail silver haired woman sitting in a ladder-back chair with a hoop of fabric across her lap. The pop of her needle through the canvas could barely be heard over the crackle of the fire in the hearth. The air smelled of charring wood and tasted of fresh ash.

The mountain skirted past the bay to dive into the sea, marking the barrier between the good, reliable folk and the wilds. Past the stone ridge sparkled brilliant turquoise waters . . . the day she saw Theresa silhouetted atop the stone ridge waving, Penelope hadn’t known if she were beckoning her to follow or waving goodbye . . .

Abigail stopped on the moonlit landing to peer up into the stern gaze of Lady Agnes De Vandelay. The oil painting of her grand-mère hung in a row of ancestors along the dark paneled wall. When Henry, her younger brother, stumbled up beside her on the grand staircase, Abigail could have sworn the portrait’s severe expression relaxed into a benevolent smile at the eager young man.

Esmerelda the Fierce, the Undefeated, stretched out her long neck and yawned, letting a puff of flame escape. The dargonologist dodged the gout of fire as the enormous beast spoke.

“I ate him in the womb.”

Lyla leaned in, lowering her voice to a whisper. “She sat there munching away on its swollen belly when another baby Dragon crept up behind her. Her head turns clean around, and I knew . . .

The raccoon pointed at the inebriated duo, staggering in a circle around one another. The king wielded a birch twig like a sword, while the raccoon hissed slurred curses. “I’ll bet you this honeysuckle scarf my dad passes out before yours.”

There was sadness in her face. Half-lidded eyes. Porcelain lips quirked halfway between hope and resignation. Lilith resettled her spindly legs on the footrests of her wheeled chair as her mother and the roboticist moved to the next model, whose mouth curved in a cheery smile. Eyes opened wide in manufactured delight.

“Definitely this model,” Lilith’s mother said. The roboticist nodded his approval, scratching on a clipboard.

“No,” Lilith whispered.

“And I’ve got my goblet.”

Brody glared. “This is no drinking game, Delaney.”

“Course not. But there’ll be inns, surely. Tents every night’ll give me a crick in m’back. Very hard to quest with a crick in your back. And inns have taverns which might run low on tankards. Best be prepared.”

“She entered the room and everything fell away.” Brody’s eyes gleamed.

Delaney gestured round the dimly lit pub with his tankard. “The floor caved and everything fell through? Very dangerous that.”

“No, metaphorical like.”

Gerald looked into the face nearly identical to his own 50 years earlier. Birthed in a lab, each clone was reared on a diet of the scientist’s memories. The safe parts. The acceptable parts. This one, the most dominate of the clones, stood over him wielding the syringe Gerald kept for the inevitability that a clone must be put down.

“This Age of Laughing is adorable.” The lead engineer conducts the tour past the incubation chambers. A shriek startles me but is quickly replaced by giggles of delight. The viewfinder shows a group of sleek robots two meters tall, somersaulting across the room.

Harold stood in the midnight switchyard to signal the oncoming train. The lantern bounced, throwing a will-o’-the-wisp against the glass, where it pulsed a vibrant green. The train sped past, and. Harold released a sigh of relief, then tapped the glass. The wisp pointed to the opposite side of the lantern.

“Heavens no.” Harold shook his head for a fiend lit the opposite lens an angry red.

Leira stalked out of the sultry night and into the workshop. The machinist, wielding a blowtorch and wearing a welding mask and heavy gloves, appeared monstrous behind a spray of amber sparks. Noticing her, he extinguished the flame and lifted his visor.

“Ma’am, may I help you?”

“Perhaps. I broke down a block or two back.” A lie, of course, but lies were her native tongue.

In the mossy hut behind the manor house, Alex leapt into the bright silver circle embedded in the stone floor. Lit by candlelight, their eyes were haunted and eager, their smile manic. They shifted into a fighter’s stance, rolled their shoulders, and announced. “Now, I’m ready.”

The insectile limbs of construction cranes broke the horizon as the rebuilding of Casino City continued into the night. Buford (part mechanic, part demon) watched with disgust. He’d torn the cursed city down after it took his dad, and now it dared to rise again.