Late Arrivals

[Hyacinth]

Our plan worked better than expected.

I expected some resistance, or at least someone asking for verification of our identities. Nobody did. Not a single person questioned us when our River City licensed van showed up with Gamma McCoy escorting Bash pretending to be Alpha Davis, even with all the newly added security. The guards simply waved us through, their eyes glassy and fogged, as if not present in their bodies.

They were more like movie zombies than werewolves and the sight of them makes my skin crawl. There is something unnatural in the way they all move in sync--from the tilt of their heads to the way they move in unison as if it is one body with many separate parts.

But the strange guards are not the only thing to change about Gold River in the short time Bash and I have been gone. In addition to the added security at the gate, there are now armed guards just beyond patrolling the main streets near the packhouse. They all move in unison as they travel from street