Samuel Verner turned his eyes away from the grim sight, lifting his gaze toward the cloud-dotted sky as he offered a prayer for the guide’s soul. With a twinge of guilt, Sam knew that his sorrow was less for the end of a life than for the injury to his own quest. He had known Mudder McAlister for only a week and hadn’t particularly liked him, finding the man ill-mannered, foul-mouthed, and abrasive. Nor was Sam amused, as was Jason, by Mudder’s rages when Gray Otter physically rebuffed his clumsy advances toward her. Sam wouldn’t miss McAlister’s company, but he had been the only runner in Perth who claimed to know where to find what Sam sought. And Cog, that faceless fixer who seemed to have connections everywhere, had given him a high competency rating.