It was a total eclipse that day, which explains how the bearded man got through. I hold his bones in my hands, two nice-sized femurs to grind into powder for broth that’ll stretch at least a week. The rest of his bones should give us a full month. Kilah, our Spotter, was the one to tell us about the beard. By the time he comes to me, he’s a skeleton, sun-bleached and sterilized. The flesh and innards Maren gave first thing to the wind and coyotes, who know best what to do with meat like that. The beard’s long gone, but we’d have little use for it anyway. Still, I’d like to have seen it.

I wonder what the man thought of our City of Rocks, if he sensed what they were even without the shadows. Did he recognize the Three Sisters, The Archer, and Mending Jane for their truth, or were they merely boulders to scurry over, to get through, on the way someplace else? Were they silent as he went past? The rocks can’t speak without their shadows, but lizards can channel on their behalf. If so, did they tell him to run? Kilah said he was running at the end, right before Pearl and Des took him down.

I volunteer to boil the femurs, tibias, fibulas, humeri, and ulnas, as my pot’s the only one big enough. Kretch handles the smaller bones. Boiling makes them brittle, makes what was once strong weak and easy to hammer into bits. Rock breaks bone, and bone begets rock; we bear witness to the cycle. We work side by side but rarely talk, conversing through pulverizing beats instead. Where were these femurs taking him? I weave my question into the cadence. To us, the bones led him to us, she drums back. Kretch and I are known as The Musicians. We’re twins, which means we’ll turn stone together one day, joining the women who came before, whenever mimah thinks the time is right. Our music will be heard by wanderers whenever the sun casts shadows in our fine City. Our drumming will be the last thing a person hears, the shadow of our shape the last thing a person sees.

“You know to save that for the final broth, right?” Pearl asks.

“Of course.” The water’s got plenty of collagen and marrow in it. Add a little acid to extract more minerals, just the way mimah taught. Kretch and I know the drill, have known it forever, but Pearl’s extra bossy since claiming womanhood this wet season. Monsoons wash anew, as mimah tells it. It’s considered lucky to get the bloods first time in the wet season, but I’m praying mine’ll come during the dry. I’d be the first to do so.

“Three clicks out,” Kilah calls, putting us on high alert. She’s been tracking two riders the last hour, and their direction’s still the same. Likely they’re thinking to shelter among the stones overnight, make camp before sundown. They’re welcome to try. We’ll gather their kits and bodies once it’s safe, set the horses free. The horses may choose to stay with us, but usually they don’t.

Kretch and I stop hammering, dampen the fire. We’ve little risk being seen among the sagebrush, as, in this part of the flats, all eyes go to the City of Rocks. Still, it bears being careful; our way of life is fragile. Pearl and Des ready their bows as backup, and Maren checks her knives. Regardless of who does the killing, us or the shadows, Maren will be needing her knives shortly. We take mimah inside. “Can’t bear the screaming anymore,” she says, though, when it comes down to it, she’s still the fiercest of us.

The incomers are close enough that we hear horses nickering and occasional low tones from the men. Kretch has bet on Mending Jane again, but I’m hoping it’s Little Corn Ears who gets to feed, as I’d like a good crop this year, rebuild our supply. When people come from the north, which is most common as there’s water that way, it’s typically The Three Sisters who reap the kill, with assistance from Bird Down if the scuffle shifts eastward. If they’re coming due west, then The Archer takes first pass, weakening them before Toad and Teddy Bear have a go. If they approach from the south, it’s almost always on horseback, like today. Only the most desperate cross the southern waste, usually men scouting for untainted land on behalf of families and, consequently, bringing valuables with them, including the horses. For those traveling from the south, it falls to either Mending Jane or Little Corn Ears to initiate the reckoning, with Shoestring just beyond to clinch the deal.

“We could use another mirror,” I whisper to Kretch. The mirror’s not for vanity; it’s for starting fires, and our other one’s cracked.

“Yes to that. But I’m wishing for medicine, maybe a canteen or two. I know Maren needs a new blade.”

“What do you suppose mimah wants this time around?”

“A lover,” we conclude in unison, then chuckle.

The horses don’t want to come any closer to the rocks, but their riders urge them past the first static outcropping, eager to escape the wind. The sun hasn’t set yet, so the shadows are still out, but, in late afternoon, they’re long and lean, pitching hard to the east. Right now, Mending Jane’s shadow fills the outline of an oval doorframe rather than a woman bent over her work, and that of Little Corn Ears looks like a row of gangly candles.

Like clockwork, the horses refuse to carry on, so the men dismount and tether them to the petrified logs we’ve planted upright, just outside of range, for that precise purpose. I borrow Kilah’s looking glass to see the men better. Both wear hats. One’s clean shaven, and the other has a moustache. Both have cowboy boots, useful for riding and navigating deep sand but not much else. Those’ll go to Pearl and Des. Their clothes are dusty but a nice, tight weave. It’s a shame they’ll soon be shredded, but we’ll wash the strips and save them for patches and bandages. Best of all, rolled blankets and oversized panniers that’ll stay with the horses, out of harm’s way.

Kretch muscles the lens away from me as one of the men unzips to piss. Eyes closed, he leans into it, letting out a satisfied sigh so loud I bet even mimah can hear. His stream tickles the far edge of Little Corn Ears’ shadow, making it look like he’s trying to douse a candle flame from a distance. Because the other man’s busy loosening a saddle, neither sees when the shadow begins to sway. What starts as sporadic twitches here and there evolves into a series of gentle, side-to-side undulations, tentative, almost coquettish, before ratcheting up to wild, hip-gyrating thrusts. I love watching Little Corn Ears dance, as graceful in death as she was in life.

Once his bladder runs dry, the man shakes, then stuffs himself back in his pants, bouncing a couple times on the balls of his feet to encourage the zipper closed. His last bunny hop propels him into full shadow, and, before his heels can touch the ground, the first cut’s already made. It’s a long but shallow slice, rending the man’s shirt from shoulder to navel along the bias so that it billows open into a toga. There’s always a delay between that first gush of red and the first scream. In this case, the scream comes from the second man, who’s caught onto the bloodletting.

The only movement now is that of the shadow, which has become a writhing darkness too fast to track. Cloth falls away from the first man in graceful sweeps, front and back, spritzes of blood leaking from torso and limbs like dainty fountain spouts. The work is feminine, precise, each cut accompanied by squeaks and tugging sounds of corn being shucked. His bones are determined to stay upright, and the man, still silent, stands tall a few seconds more. Little Corn Ears wastes no time with the killing blow, delivering a horizontal slash across and through the man’s throat that tips his head back, his neck an obliging hinge. If his eyes still work, he’d see the sky melting into horizon, layers of orange and magenta trailing one last sliver of glowing sun. Moments later, the man melts, too, his slumped body merging with landscape.

“Des, Pearl, go,” Kilah urges. Her eyepiece is trained on the second man, whose cowardice has unwittingly saved him from the shadows. His hands fumble with buckles. His screams upset both horses, and he’s having trouble getting a foot in a stirrup.

“Don’t let him escape,” comes a quiet, commanding voice from behind our heads. Mimah’s hobbled back outside to see what’s what.

The Romero sisters are small but quick, knowing intuitively to circle around and approach from the rear. It’s an inefficient strategy but one that maintains the element of surprise. In the meantime, the man’s unhitched his horse and managed to launch himself. But the girth’s far too loose, and the horse is uncooperative. As it rears up, the saddle slips sideways, tumbling the man straight into the dirt. He’s smart enough to roll away, but, by the time he’s able to sit up on his knees, Des and Pearl have him doubly lassoed. He never saw them coming. His horse did, and, because of it, it’s now running free.

Kretch and I head onto the sands to claim the remaining horse, carefully skirting the boulders to collect fallen gear along the way. She finds a rifle stowed in a stray blanket roll, hands it to me, then marches the horse toward the tents. Des and Pearl follow, the bound man lumbering mummy-like between them, and I bring up the rear, muzzle aimed at his back just in case. He’s got a good figure; mimah’ll be pleased. As for the corpse, we’ll return after nightfall to collect, once all the shadows have gone to bed.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” the man’s saying. His sobs are now ones of relief. He has lots of questions. What was that out there? What killed his friend? How’d we know he needed help? How’d we get there so fast? Is it safe now? He tells us his name is Del, short for Delgadino, asks for our names. Says he’s heading north, hears there’s a Reclamation boomtown near freshwater past the old boundary line, asks if we’re from there. Says he’s exhausted, they’d been traveling for days, the horse needs a proper rest, asks if we have feed, asks to stay a while, gather his wits, recuperate, let the horse recuperate.

Finally, he asks where we’re going, to which Pearl replies, “Here.” Mimah’s rekindled the fire, and her face at the campsite is warm and beckoning. A smell in the air suggests food and something warm to drink. The man asks to sit. We let him. He prepares to tell his story. We don’t let him. Instead, we let Maren cut out his tongue. His voice is a liability.

We stuff rags in his mouth to stem the flow, clean him up a little. Up close, I notice some strands of silver in his moustache. It never ceases to amaze me how easily men assume, upon seeing us, that our intentions are good. 

“Blaze,” I tell him. “My name is Blaze.” I point to Kretch and say her name, then do the same for Pearl, Des, Maren, and Kilah. “But the name you really ought to know is mimah.” And with that, mimah envelops him in her stony arms, whispers the words of welcome in his ears, words I memorize for when it’s my time to say them.

Nancy S. Koven (she/they) is an American author who divides her time between New Mexico and Maine. She is a psychologist and professor emerita who now edits and writes full time. If you see her looking up at the sky, she’s likely spotted a turkey vulture. Her work has appeared in Change Seven, Defenestration, and is forthcoming in Thin Skin.