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“You’ll be here for Cyrus, then,” said the man. “Third floor, second room on the left. Stairs are at the end of the hall.”

Eli nodded his thanks and took the lead, guiding the group toward the stairs and giving Jack the freedom to take in his surroundings for a moment, which he was grateful for, because he’d never been surrounded by anything quite like this.

Ceilings strung with metal fixtures loomed high above, propped up by walls of chipping white-painted brick. Small windows rimming the uppermost level cast delicate white moonlight onto the cement floors in little rectangles, but otherwise the space sat in a moody sort of darkness, air chill and damp and tinged with the scent of disuse. Along the walls were little white tents, each marked with strange symbols, presumably to identify the vendors or the nature of the wares inside. Hushed voices filled the musty air as buyers and sellers of the intangible negotiated for things neither should know existed.

The flap of a nearby tent opened and Jack caught a glimpse inside: a table full of odd-looking eyeglasses he couldn’t begin to imagine the use for. Then, just as quickly as the tent’s innards appeared, they were back beneath the secretive white flesh of tarp.

A winding metal staircase greeted the group at the far end of the factory, sprouting from the cement floor like a fairy-tale beanstalk. Jack took the rear as they climbed, twisting upward, the Master List secure in his purse. They reached the third floor and turned left to the room containing some guy named Cyrus, who they were apparently here for. Once again, it was Eli who knocked on the door.

This time they were greeted not by eyes, much less the entirety of a person. Instead, a voice on the other side said, “Come in,” and so they did.

The room was lit only by a vintage green desk lamp, spilling yellow onto stacks of papers and oddities including an amulet holding a rich red stone, books as old as anything Jack had seen in the S.C.Y.T.H.E. archives, and no fewer than three human skulls.

Behind the desk and the collection of death tchotchkes stood a thin man in a pinstripe suit and itty-bitty wire-rimmed glasses. His shoulder-length hair—half jet-black and half whiter than the moon beyond the window—dusted the collar of his suit, and his long, skinny fingers were in the middle of skittering over the papers on the desk as the group entered. This was Cyrus, Jack supposed. Also, unfortunately, this was the man with the chains. He was older now, and there were no chains in sight, but it was unmistakably him.

“Ah, Eli and friends, excellent.” Cyrus’s fingers stopped skittering and found one another in his lap as he lowered himself into the leather chair behind the desk. He looked to be in his early forties by Jack’s best estimate, though for all he knew, the man was actually some kind of ancient vampire. Nothing seemed off the table these days. All Jack properly knew about him, besides the recent development that his name was Cyrus, was that he’d done something that thoroughly freaked out Eli back in the day and now he worked for an underground marketplace of death merchants. The combination of these facts didn’t do much to endear Cyrus to Jack, if he was honest.

“Please, sit.” Cyrus waved a spidery hand at the two chairs in front of the desk without paying any mind to the fact that four people and one disembodied spirit stood across from him. Jack supposed math didn’t matter much to someone who dwelled in the hinterland between life and death, but even a dead man like Jack still employed basic arithmetic from time to time. Eli, whose cheeks had grown white again in Cyrus’s presence, took one of the chairs without further prompting. The rest, apparently unsure of how to navigate this without ending up in one another’s laps, opted to stand.

“It’s been a while.” Cyrus flashed a toothy grin at Eli, who didn’t seem to have enough blood flow to reply. “May I?” He reached forward and scooped up one of Eli’s hands, unfurling the clutched fingers and revealing a line etched into Eli’s palm from where he’d cut it all those years ago. Cyrus gave a small chuckle. “God, we were dumb back then.” He held his own palm out to Eli, revealing a matching scar. Then he shook his head, still chuckling, and returned to his seat. “Now, I believe you have something for me?”

Jack dug into his purse and pulled out the envelope that held the Master List. He began to extend it toward Cyrus, but something inside him made him stop mid-reach. At first he wondered if it was Margaret, but she still felt distant. No, it was something else, something from Jack. A conscience? Inconvenient timing if so. But the memory of that soul-snatching memo in the S.C.Y.T.H.E. archives crept back into his thoughts, the black ink stark and foreboding.

“It’s all right,” said Cyrus. “I just need to appraise it so we know what to start the bidding at.”

Jack could feel the names of everyone scribbled across the list pressing against his fingertips. He quite literally held their lives, or at least their afterlives, in his hands. Could he truly trust the man who scared even Eli to do right by them?

Before he could decide, Greer slid the envelope from his grasp and placed it in Cyrus’s outstretched hand. Cyrus eased the list out and held it gingerly in front of his face, pale blue eyes heavy with reverence. “I’ve heard rumors about this existing for years, but I never thought…” He took a deep breath. “I won’t be long, if you wouldn’t mind waiting downstairs. You’ll stay for the auction, of course, as my guests.”

Eli rose and everyone turned to leave, but Jack couldn’t quite bring himself to move just yet.

“What’ll happen to them?”

“To who?” asked Cyrus.

“The names on the list. The people.”

“That depends on who buys it, of course,” said Cyrus.

“Of course,” said Jack.

Greer took him by the arthritic wrist. “Come on.”

Jack reluctantly allowed himself to be dragged from the room, his mind still on the list. If the look on Cyrus’s face was any indication, it was worth a fortune, but at what cost? Not that that mattered, of course. His job was nearly done. He reminded himself of this fact on repeat as they spiraled back down the iron staircase to the main floor.

Downstairs, he slowly returned to his senses. Sure, they’d initially set out to sell the information to the people on the list or their loved ones, who’d most benefit from the foreknowledge of impending death, but that hadn’t panned out, so they’d had no choice but to pivot. There was no use fighting it. And the very same was true of death. The soon-to-die and their loved ones were no worse off than if Jack had never found the Master List to begin with, surely.

Jack had never experienced cold feet before, in all his years of schemes, and he wasn’t about to start now.

He offered a gentle elbow to Eli’s side. “You good?”

Eli was staring off into the distance. “Fine.”

“I’m looking forward to getting the fuck out of here, I’ll tell you what,” said Carter.

“Dude, it’s fine. Nothing bad’s happened, right?” said Jack. At least, nothing to any of them.

“This whole place has a messed-up vibe,” said Carter.