Trinket gripped the doorframe as Booker rushed to Daphne. "What happened?" he asked, scooping Gin up into his arms.

Daphne held her hands out helplessly and shook her head. She was still in her nightgown, her hair mussed and sleep in her eyes. Looking to Trinket, she opened her mouth as if to speak, but closed it and swallowed before turning her worried gaze back to the injured urchin.

"We need to tend to these wounds immediately," Booker said as he raced down the stairs.

Trinket threw one last desperate glance at Daphne. The woman bit her lip, a line forming between her eyes as they darted to the laboratory stairway. Trinket took a shaky breath and gave a short nod before chasing after Booker.

Gin was lying on the operating table while Booker frantically collected jars from the shelves lining the walls. Unsure of what to do with herself, Trinket stood by Gin and gently brushed the dark hair out of the girl's face. It was tangled in sticky knots, and as she ran her fingers through it, she felt something wet and warm. Pulling back, she found that her hand was covered in blood. There was a gash the length and width of her finger on the back of Gin's head.

Grabbing a rag, she pressed it against the wound and held it firmly despite the urchin's hiss of pain. Swallowing down her emotions, Trinket tried to focus on Gin's face. But that, too, caused her throat to tighten when she took in the girl's crooked nose and bruised jaw. Someone had brutally tortured her. And by the looks of her missing nails and broken fingers, they had been very thorough.

The thought made Trinket's stomach turn.

Booker stumbled over with tools and supplies in his arms, clumsily tossing them onto a nearby table. His face was pale and drawn as he accessed the condition of his favorite informant. "All right, Gin, I'm going to give you something for the pain."

With trembling hands, he scooped powder out of a jar and mixed it into a beaker of water. "I didn't tell him anything," Gin wheezed, turning to face him.

A muscle in his jaw twitched at the sound of her hoarse, strained voice. "Who?"

She shook her head. "I didn't. Not a word. Not anything."

His eyes briefly darted to Trinket before returning to Gin. "Scales?"

He barely whispered the name, but it seemed to echo throughout the entire room. Gin nodded and smiled, her bloodied lips lifting to reveal missing teeth that had not been missing before. "He kept asking about the vampire and your friend. But I didn't say a word. Not one word."

Booker bit his lip and turned his attention to the mixture in his hands. "Here, drink this. It'll help."

But the urchin pushed the beaker away as she sat up, her swollen eyes fixed on him. "I swear, I didn't say anything. I swear."

"We believe you, Gin. We do," Trinket said, trying to ease her back onto the table.

Gin refused to cooperate and grabbed Booker's wrist. "I had to go," she said, her voice cracking, her eyes wild and desperate. "I had to go out and watch for Scales and keep him from trying to hurt you. I had to. You understand, right? I had to protect you."

Booker parted his lips, and they trembled slightly as he groped for words. But when Gin cried out and doubled over in pain, he set his jaw and put the beaker aside to check the girl's pulse.

Trinket's eyes stung from the tears she held back as she imagined the sadistic grin on Scales' face, the sick delight he must have gotten from breaking this precious little girl. All to punish Booker.

Booker.

She turned her gaze to him. His fingers trailed gently over each bruise and cut, flinching whenever his touch elicited a wince from the urchin. Though he worked with the same concentration he had with all his patients, there was an undeniable fear in his eyes. His hands shook and his nostrils flared with both anger and panic as he examined his beloved Gin.

"Broken ribs," he muttered. "Likely injuries to the lungs. And internal bleeding."

He rushed back to the shelves and retrieved another jar. Trinket stroked Gin's hair as the urchin gasped for breath. She would have done absolutely anything to ease the girl's pain, to trade places with her, to make it all go away. But instead, she continued to stand by helplessly, hoping that by some miracle she might be able to transfer strength into Gin simply through her touch.

But Gin was stronger than she was. She always had been.

Gin was strong.

She'd make it through this.

She had to.

Booker returned and took a pinch of reddish-orange powder from the jar in his hand. Coaxing Gin's mouth open, he smeared it on her tongue. "Swallow this for the bleeding," he said, massaging her throat.

Gin squeezed her eyes shut and complied, letting out a heart-wrenching cry as she did. After a moment, her eyes opened again, and she looked up at Trinket. Her gaze wandered back and forth, piercing Trinket straight through the heart when she realized how little strength the girl had left.

When she realized Gin was losing the fight.

Gin focused on Booker. "Did I do good?" she whispered.

Tears welled up in his eyes, and he swallowed with some difficulty as he nodded. "Yes, Gin. You did good. You did very good." He offered a soft smile. "Like always, you were brilliant."

His words brought a grin to the girl's face. He cupped her cheek and placed a gentle kiss between her eyes. Her eyelids fluttered closed, her entire expression turning peaceful even as her body trembled and twitched. Booker pulled away, and Gin gave him one last playful smile before taking a final, hiccuping breath.

And then she was still, the spark gone from her amber eyes. The tremors in her body had ceased, and that irresistible, intimidating energy that had always emanated from her faded away. Everything that made Gin who she was seemed to disappear, leaving behind an empty, lifeless shell.

Gin was gone.

The silence was suffocating. It couldn't be true. This couldn't be happening. She couldn't be gone.

Not her.

Not Gin.

A knot formed in Trinket's throat as tears pricked at her eyes, threatening to burst forth like a torrent. But she couldn't cry. If she let herself cry, she'd lose all control. And she couldn't do that. Not now. Not when she had a job to do.

And that job was to keep Booker from falling apart.

She forced down her tears and turned her attention to him. There was a slight panic in his expression as he stared down at Gin's lifeless body, almost a stubborn refusal to accept that this was real. His eyes wandered back and forth, and he licked his pale lips, as though he were waiting for the urchin to take her next breath. Waiting for her to sit up and flash him a teasing smile. Waiting for her to tell him he worried too much, that it would take more than a few cuts and bruises to knock her out of the game.

But she didn't.

Her body remained unmoving on the table. He reached out to touch her but then stopped, his hand hovering inches from her broken fingers. He stared for a long while until his breathing became suddenly erratic. It all seemed to crash in on him at once, and something inside him must have snapped.

Letting out an agonizing cry, he flipped over the table that held his tools, sending the instruments flying through the room.

Before they could even hit the floor, he stormed over to the shelves lining the walls. In one violent sweep, he knocked everything off of them, shattering most of the jars and spilling their contents across the room.

He turned to the workbenches and did the same to them. A mechanical hand crashed to the ground, bursting into tiny metal pieces that mixed in with the panicked beetles that had been freed from their smashed jar.

Now at his desk, he threw his papers and notebooks to the floor before collapsing into the chair. He panted and gripped the desktop, his eyes wide and wild.

Trinket was still standing by the operating table, her every muscle tense and alert as she waited for his blind rage to subside. Then, all at once, he crumpled over the desk and burst into tears.

She slowly made her way over to him, sidestepping the shards of glass and flesh-eating beetles. She hesitated, watching helplessly as his shoulders trembled with each hysterical sob. What should she do? She'd never seen him like this before. What did he need? Consolation? Solitude?

Gently placing a hand on his back, she opened her mouth to speak but was cut off by the bell upstairs. Booker's head shot up, and in an instant, he was on his feet, barreling up the steps and bursting through the door. She ran after him, terrified of what he might do.

Daphne stood before the front door, gazing out into the dark and empty night. "Daphne? Who is it?" Booker called out, grasping the stair railing as he set his intense gaze on her.

She turned to him, her warm eyes filled with tears, and held out her hand. In it was the tiny mechanical crow Booker had made for Gin. Or at least, that's what it had been. Now it was nothing more than a pile of gears and springs and metal, having been crushed to pieces and destroyed, just like the little girl it had once belonged to.

Trinket swallowed down another sob. Booker took the broken toy from Daphne, gazing down at it with such pain and incredulity that Trinket could hardly stand to look. It was like watching his heart break all over again.

Closing his hand over the mess of gears and springs, he raced back down to the laboratory. Daphne cast Trinket a worried glance. Forcing down her tears once more, Trinket moved to chase after him, but he was back before she could take a single step, a pistol clutched in his hand. He stormed towards the door, and she realized what he was going to do.

"Booker, no!" she cried out, grabbing his arm and pulling him back.

He tried to tug his arm free. "I'm going to kill him. I'm going to blow his blasted brains out."

She would not relinquish her hold on him. "He's baiting you, Booker. This is what he wants you to do."

"And he's going to get more than he bargained for, the bleeding cur."

Again, he tried to break free from her, but she held on tightly. "It won't bring her back!"

He stopped struggling and turned to her slowly.

She panted, still refusing to let him go for fear he would run straight for the door. "It won't bring her back, Booker," she said, more softly this time. "All you'll do is get yourself killed after she worked so hard to protect you. She wouldn't want you to do that. You know she wouldn't."

He swallowed and looked down at the pistol in his hand. His eyes went wide, and the rage and panic faded away. She let out a breath of relief, finally daring to release him now that his senses seemed to have returned.

She pushed the hair out of her face. "Booker, we—"

"I'm so sorry," he said, pressing the pistol into her hands. "I have to go."

He turned away and headed towards the stairs. "Booker?" she called after him.

Shaking his head, he continued up the steps without looking back. "I'm sorry. I'm just . . . I'm sorry, I can't."

He disappeared around the corner, and a door slammed closed.

Staring up the stairs for a moment longer, Trinket finally looked down at the gun in her hands and then turned to Daphne. Taking a deep breath, she squeezed her eyes shut and thought about Gin downstairs in the laboratory.

Cold.

Lifeless.

All alone.

She couldn't leave her like that. And she couldn't let Booker deal with it all later.

"Daphne," she said, opening her eyes as she fought back tears, "I need your help."

~

It was a long walk to the cemetery as Trinket and Daphne carried Gin through the dark and lonely streets. Trinket knew it was a risk. Scales was still out there, seething and raging against Booker, looking for any opportunity to lash out at him.

If he had found her before Gin, would she be the one being hauled off to the graveyard? Would she have been the one to endure unspeakable torture?

With the weight of the dead urchin in her arms, she desperately wished it had been her instead.

The cemetery was on the same road as the police station. It was a good distance away, like they tried to set it as far from the city as possible. Was it to keep from being reminded of the fate that would eventually claim them all? It was a ridiculous notion in a city like Tinkerfall where death seemed to be the order of the day.

They approached the wrought-iron fence that surrounded the graveyard, all rusted with missing spires. Trinket tucked Booker's pistol into her pocket and exchanged a look with Daphne before taking a trembling breath. She nudged the gate open, and it let out a sickly creak, alerting the gravekeeper to their arrival. He stumbled out of the tiny shack situated by the entrance, his blonde hair sticking up on end and his filthy nightshirt unbuttoned and askew. Scratching his scalp with dirt-stained fingers, he shuffled his way over to them.

"We need a grave," Trinket said. "Tonight."

The man eyed her and Daphne drowsily before settling his gaze on the bundle of blankets in her arms. "Man, woman, or child?"

She swallowed the painful knot in her throat. "Child. A girl. About eleven years old."

He nodded and covered an obnoxious yawn as he jerked his head towards a cart already loaded with bodies. "Toss it on. I'll get to it when I can."

Apparently thinking they were finished, he turned back to his shack, but Trinket stepped forward. "No," she said firmly. "It needs to be done tonight. Right now."

Glancing over his shoulder, he looked her up and down, clearly unimpressed. "And I said I'd get to it when—"

She pulled out a purse filled with money. This caught his attention, and as she shook it, the sound of the coins rattling against each other seemed to convince him to return. He moved to take the purse, but she drew back.

The dirty man heaved a heavy sigh. "Standard burial?"

"The best you can provide on such short notice," she said.

"Fine."

"And protection from graverobbers."

He sighed again. "Fine, fine, I'll erect a mortsafe over the plot. And the stone? How should it be marked?"

She bit her lip and considered how to sum up the urchin. There weren't enough words in the world to do her credit. But she believed she knew what would have brought a smile to the girl's face were she still here.

"Gin Larkin," she said. "Beloved and brilliant friend."

The gravekeeper raised a skeptical eyebrow but then shrugged and put out his open palm. "I'll see it done."

Letting out a slow breath, she handed him the purse. He opened it up and did not even try to hide his grin as he took in the amount of money inside. She had probably overpaid, but it didn't matter. Just as long as Gin received a proper burial.

"Very good," he said, tucking the purse into his pocket. He held out his arms to take Gin. "I'll get on this right away."

Trinket hesitated. Even though she knew Gin was gone, she was reluctant to let her go. Her body was stiff and cold, absent of the vivacity it had been brimming with in life. Still, to surrender her to this rude, uncaring man meant that this was the end. This was the last time she would ever see or hold her. After this, she would be deep beneath the ground, forever lost to this world.

It was too real.

Holding back the tears she had yet to shed, she handed Gin over to the gravekeeper. As the little girl's body left her arms, a terrible emptiness settled in Trinket's chest, and it took everything in her to keep from falling apart right then and there. Daphne reached for her hand and gave it a tight squeeze. Trinket forced a weak smile, and together, they followed after the gravekeeper.

~

By the time the burial was complete, the sun was just beginning to peek over the horizon. The gravekeeper patted down the loose dirt one last time with his shovel before pulling out a handkerchief and wiping the sweat from his brow.

"I'll set the stone up after I finish the inscription," he said, leaning against the shovel to inspect his work. "And I'll put together a mortsafe to keep the resurrectionists at bay. That work for you?"

Trinket gazed down at the grave, still unable to grasp the fact that Gin was under all of that earth and stone. Gin, the spirited urchin who had teased her and followed her about the market. The girl who, on more than one occasion, had rescued her from certain harm, perhaps even saving her life. She was dead and buried beneath this mound of dirt.

It was unthinkable.

It was impossible.

But it was true.

Gin was dead.

Nodding, Trinket tore her eyes away from the burial plot and focused on the gravekeeper. "Yes, thank you," she said softly.

The man inclined his head and threw the shovel over his shoulder, meandering his way back to the shack. After watching him disappear inside, she cast one last look at the grave. Her chest ached as she took a deep breath and closed her eyes.

"Goodbye, Gin," she whispered.

The words lingered in the air even as she turned away and started back towards the road. Daphne put an arm around her and held her close. Trinket leaned her head against her shoulder and released a long, tearful sigh.

The city center was silent and still as they passed through it on their way home. It was fitting. What would this place be like now that Gin was gone? This had been her city, which she had robbed blind and manipulated with the skill of a true criminal. How would it carry on without her? How would they carry on without her?

Life would never be the same.

Something landed in front of them, pulling her away from her dismal thoughts. There was a beaten-up bowler hat laying in the middle of the street.

No, not just any bowler hat.

Gin's bowler hat.

As she stooped down to pick it up, a familiar chuckle echoed through the street. Clutching the hat to her chest, she pulled Booker's pistol from her pocket and aimed for Scales who was standing in the shadows by the abandoned flower shop.

"Missing something?" he asked.

She bristled at the obvious delight in his voice. "You monster."

A grin tugged at one side of his mouth as he stepped forward. "No Larkin?" he asked innocently. "What, the man can butcher cadavers but can't bear to bury one of his own?"

The sight of his smile twisted Trinket's stomach into a sick knot to match the one in her throat.

"I must confess, I worried when I dropped the little brat on your doorstep that she'd croak before he found her. It would've been a waste of my time and effort if he hadn't been able to watch her die."

Her grip on the pistol tightened as she clenched her jaw and aimed it between his eyes.

He scoffed. "You don't have the nerve."

"Just try me, Scales."

He raised his eyebrows, as if daring her to prove him wrong.

She swallowed hard and tried to pull the trigger. He deserved it. This vile creature deserved it. No one would blame her. He deserved to die for what he had done.

And yet she could not will her trembling finger to move.

Heaving an exasperated sigh, Scales knocked the pistol out of her hands with his walking stick and caught it before she could even react. With a victorious smirk, he cocked the gun and fixed it on her. Daphne reached for her boot, but he whipped the barrel in her direction and clucked his tongue.

"I don't know where you came from, darling, but I'm not as stupid as certain other Mice," he said, resentment dripping from his every word. "Go for that knife, and I'll blow your brains out without a second thought."

Trinket's breath hitched. She couldn't lose another friend, especially not to this disgusting excuse for a man.

Daphne held his stare for a long, tense moment and then finally stood up straight, raising her hands in the air and lifting her eyebrows.

"Good girl," Scales said. "You know how to take orders. Unlike your employer."

He turned his attention back to Trinket while still aiming the pistol at Daphne. A smug smile played on his lips as he looked her up and down. Then his eyes rested on Gin's hat clutched to her chest, and he gave another low chuckle.

"Don't worry, my dear," he said, the mocking inflection on Booker's patented phrase unmistakable. "I won't be taking you out of the game so quickly. You aren't replaceable like these other pawns."

He motioned at the bowler hat, and she held it closer. "You're a monster," she hissed.

"Oh, you flatter me."

"How could you do such a thing? To a child, no less."

"Funny, I thought I showed great restraint considering what Larkin did to me. That urchin couldn't be worth nearly as much as all my hard work that went to waste thanks to your employer's unbridled tongue. I daresay the scales are nowhere near even. Yet."

Her hands shook as her grip on the hat tightened. "What would your sister think of the person you've become?"

She knew it was a mistake as soon as she said it, but she couldn't take it back. The words drifted through the air, followed by a deadly silence.

Scales' face twisted in pain and anger. His nostrils flared as he took a sharp breath. "What did you say?" he whispered.

All her courage fled her, and she fell back a step.

"What did you say?" he repeated, his voice rising with every word until he was screaming into the night.

Stillness again.

Not a peep.

There wasn't a night flower or urchin in sight. It was just the three of them. All alone. But with the venomous glint in Scales' eyes, it would only take a single slip of the tongue for the numbers to plummet.

Closing his eyes, he collected himself and took a step towards her. "Larkin has no idea what it's like to have everything torn away from him in the most vicious and violent way possible," he said.

His fiery gaze threatened to burn a hole straight through her, but she couldn't help but notice the slight tremble in his hand as he continued to aim the pistol at Daphne.

"But he will. Soon enough, he will." He nodded at the bowler hat. "You think this was bad?"

Taking another step forward, he flashed her a sickening grin, and she couldn't repress a shudder.

"This was nothing compared to what I have in store," he went on. "Just you wait, my dear. Just. You. Wait."

A gunshot shattered the silence, and she jumped despite herself. Fear clawed at her chest as she turned to Daphne, expecting to find her head blown off and her blood splattered on the road. But the woman was unharmed, save for a single dark curl that fell to the ground. Aside from a slight widening of her eyes, she showed no sign of surprise.

Scales raised his eyebrows at Trinket. "Give Larkin my best."

He turned away from her and tossed the pistol over his shoulder. She flinched as it barreled towards her face, but at the last minute, Daphne caught it. Letting out a long breath, Trinket tried to see where Scales had run off to, terrified that he might be lingering nearby. But he was gone, leaving only a feeling of unease in his wake.

She turned to Daphne who was tucking the pistol into her pocket. Sensing her gaze, Daphne looked up and raised her eyebrows.

Glancing down at the hat clutched in her hands, Trinket took a trembling breath. "We should get back," she said.

Daphne nodded and put an arm around her shoulders, leading her in the direction of home. The streets were just as still and silent as before, but there was an undeniable sense of danger in the air.

This wasn't the end of Scales' wrath. It was only the beginning. And with his temper flaring and his emotions on edge, he was far deadlier than he'd ever been before.

~

When at last they were home, Trinket let out a long sigh. "Thank you for everything, Daphne. You should get some rest now."

Daphne finished locking the door and furrowed her brow at her.

Trinket shook her head. "I'm fine. I just need some time to collect my thoughts."

Still, Daphne laid a hand on her arm and gave it a squeeze.

"You've done more than enough," Trinket insisted with an appreciative smile. "Go back to bed. Please."

Though she seemed reluctant, Daphne finally nodded and headed up the stairs, casting a single worried glance over her shoulder before disappearing around the corner.

When Trinket was certain she was gone, she made her way into the parlour. Collapsing onto the settee, she gazed down at the bowler hat and fingered the worn and water-stained rim. Memories of Gin peeking out from beneath it played through her head.

She would never see that dirty, mischievous face again.

Or those clever, playful eyes.

Or that bright, teasing grin.

The reality of it all came crashing down on her, and she curled up into a ball, clutching the hat to her chest as the tears she had been holding back finally broke free. Hysterical sobs wracked her entire body as she was plagued by a single recurring thought:

Gin was dead.

~

Sitting up with a gasp, she glanced about the parlour. Light was spilling through the curtains, and the clock in the corner chimed to announce the late morning hour. Gin's hat was still clutched to her chest, crumpled on one side from being slept on.

Releasing a long breath, she tried to rub away the tears that had dried on her cheeks. Her eyes were swollen and her head throbbed like she had been slamming it against a brick wall for hours on end.

Everything from the night before came rushing back.

Gin beaten and bruised.

That horrifying instance when the urchin took her last breath.

Booker's complete breakdown—

Booker.

She hadn't seen or heard from him since she stopped him from hunting down Scales. Was he still in his room? Or had he snuck away to take his anger out on the ex-Mouse? Panic seized her heart as she imagined him lying dead in the street, battered and broken like Gin, Scales gloating over his lifeless body.

No. No, he wouldn't be so stupid.

Except she knew he was.

He was so stupid. Incredibly stupid and impetuous and, at the moment, utterly heartbroken. He was capable of anything.

Setting aside Gin's hat, she rose to her feet and hurried to the stairs. She practically tripped up the steps, ignoring the small streams of blood winding down the railing and dripping from the walls.

His door was closed and covered in blood. Was it real? She didn't know. But she had to believe it wasn't.

At least for now.

"Booker?" she called out as she knocked, her knuckles stained with the sticky, warm blood that she could only hope was a figment of her broken mind.

No response.

She tried again, and this time, she thought she heard the rustle of papers. Taking a deep breath, she opened the door and slipped inside.

Booker was sitting at his writing desk, hunched over with his head in his hands as he stared down at a pile of papers in front of him. The walls in here were bleeding, too, but he didn't seem to notice. She ignored the blood and took hesitant steps towards him. What sort of reaction would she get from him? Anger? Resentment? Cold indifference?

"Booker?" she said, now only a handbreadth away from him.

He started and turned to her, his bloodshot eyes wild with panic. But when he saw it was her, the muscles in his face relaxed, and he swallowed hard.

"Booker, I'm—"

Before she could even fumble for the right words to say, he rose from his chair and pulled her into an embrace. It took her by surprise, and she wasn't sure how to react as he buried his face in her shoulder.

"I loved her," he whispered. "I loved her so much. And I was careless with her. I was careless, and now she's gone."

Warm tears fell onto her neck. She wrapped her arms around him and gently stroked his hair as he trembled in her arms.

"I was careless," he said, choking on a sob. "I was careless, and now I've lost her. It's all my fault."

She rested her head against his, and he held her closer as a violent shudder ran through his body. She squeezed her eyes shut as tears rolled down her cheeks.

"I promise, Trinket," he whispered, "I promise that I won't be so careless again. I promise."

Unable to find the words to respond, she laid a soft kiss atop his head and held him tight. He drew her even closer, as if he were afraid she might disappear if he dared to let go. As she tightened her embrace, all her previous fears of growing close to him played through her head.

The fear of disappointing him with who she really was.

The fear of him discovering what she had done.

The fear of hurting him the way she had hurt Merrill.

But as they held each other close in their shared sorrow, all these thoughts were pushed aside. It didn't matter. The past, the future, her secrets, her fears. They didn't matter. Not right now. All that mattered right then was that she was there for her employer.

Her best friend.

The man she loved.

Somehow, they would find a way to get through this.

Together.