This ballad was shared at the 57th Conclave of Bards by Thibult Woosjyn, Sindar Station (North) Stationmaster.

Omar’s trigger finger itches.

It strokes the hot metal guard of his mama’s old six-shooter, following the curl of steel around and around the sharp curve of the trigger.

Omar’s mouth twitches into a smile. His tongue pokes through the space where two of his left teeth used to be, the lone shard of his canine finally dulled down to a nub. Patience, he reminds himself. He’s waited so long. He can wait a little longer.

He sees the smoke, now, a roiling black cloud stark — even from this distance — against the white-hot sky. The Speeding Sinner approaches, the brand-new flagship train of the East-of-Sindar Railroad Company. Its black opal coating glimmers in the sun, a shimmering rainbow barreling through the desert.

“Boss.” The voice, low and brusque, is Feroina’s. “We don’t need it.” Her horse shuffles, bobs its head, huffs as if exasperated. It’s always moving, even when it should be still.

Omar sits up straighter in his saddle. He arches his back. He takes a long deep breath — so deep his toes and fingers tingle, so deep his eyes water, so deep his lungs feel like a bladder about to burst. And he lets all that air out with a long shrill yodel.

“Ladies,” Omar calls. He turns left and then right in his saddle, surveying the line of his gang — six women on either side of him, Feroina to his immediate right. “It’s now or never. Look alive and move quick. The Speeding Sinner is crawling with Catechism agents, and they’ll be good at their job.”

He avoids Feroina’s icy eyes and their cold accusation about the one key detail he’s omitting.

“The payload will be under heavy guard and triply Bound. Make sure Miss Roxy Rose gets there in one piece.”

A woman to his far left, wrapped in a shawl with a poncho over that, nods.

“And remember,” he says. And now he meets Feroina’s unblinking eyes, and the sweat on his back goes cold. He’s always loved that about her. He winks. “Have fun.”

He spurs his horse into a gallop.

And they’re off.

Ansley’s gloved hand sweats.

It squeezes the handle of her daddy’s old knife so tightly she can feel the leather fibers tearing against the reinforced grip. She grips the knife so tight her jaw and ribs and hips ache.

Just another knot yet to be unraveled.

She watches the dead land around the Speeding Sinner flash by, as hideous as the blue-gold floral wallpaper covering every inch of every gods-damned train car. The distance between Griffith and Sindar stations is the longest of the entire line. That it is the closest to the center of the Amal Empire makes no difference. If the gang is going to strike, it will be now or never.

“Ma’am.” The voice, high and taut, is Murrow’s. “I will be reporting all this to the Executor.” He crosses his arms, his Binder’s tattoos peeking out from the shift of his wrist sleeves, the holstered pistol rising awkwardly on his hip. She realizes he’s been speaking this whole time.

“Report what?” she says. She keeps her face innocent and honey-sweet.

“Your behavior,” Murrow snarls. “Your inexcusable waste of Imperial resources. Your wanton disregard for policy and standards.”

“I believe, Agent Murrow,” she says, “you are leaving out reckless endangerment.”

He gawks, then recovers. “The Executor likes me. She’ll listen,” he says. “She’ll know I should have been number one on this—”

“And yet the Executor made you my deputy.”

Ansley rises, her hand tightening around the knife. Murrow flinches and steps back. She watches his face register the weakness of this impulse.

“They’ll come,” she says. She steps forward, puts her nose so close into his face she can smell the stew they ate for lunch in the dining car. “And you’d better be ready, or you won’t stand a fucking chance.”

His eyes narrow. She sees how much he hates her. Disrespects her. How glad he’ll be when she’s finally out on her ass, like she should have been all those years ago. He opens his mouth.

“Special Agent Dreddmann.”

A different voice, from a different agent behind her.

“What?” she snaps. She keeps her glare trained on Murrow.

“Contact in car three. We’re being boarded.”

She can’t keep the smile from her lips. She knows Murrow thinks she’s gloating. But he doesn’t know how relieving it is for one knot to start untying itself.

“Alert the men,” Ansley says. “And remind them all: He’s mine.”

“Now all y’all listen up and listen good,” Omar drawls. This is his favorite part. “We’re the Dandy Dreddmanns, and I know our reputation precedes us. We sure worked hard to make that so.”

His ladies fan out around him, weapons drawn. Feroina stands behind him, the glimmer of her dual twelve-shooters in his eyes.

Omar winks at a woman in the aisle. She stares impassively. He grins: She’s tougher than they usually are.

“I won’t lie,” he continues. “All that massacring could’ve been avoided if everyone involved had just kept. Their. Cool.”

Roxy Rose, flanked by three of his ladies, steps into the car behind them. They’ll clear out the two trailing this one as well as the caboose, then together work their way up the line. Omar keeps his ears perked for gunfire, but he’s not worried.

He blows a kiss at a man sitting by the window. The man doesn’t flinch.

Now, that strikes Omar as odd.

He takes a moment to survey the passengers. No one’s screaming. No one’s weeping. No one’s even sweating.

Omar’s tongue probes the gap in his teeth. Have the exploits of his Dandies numbed citizens into such instantaneous submission? Seems unlikely. Unless…

He senses the whir of motion before he sees it. Feroina’s gunshot rings out before he can turn. But he does see the body of a woman — the same woman at whom he winked — fall crumpled and dead to the ground.

And he certainly sees the dagger in her hand.

And then chaos breaks. Feroina takes a club to the shoulder. Gunfire clatters out in all directions. He drops to the ground, but a man is already there — the same man at whom he blew a kiss — and Omar feels the man’s fist collide with his own chin. Hard.

Omar’s teeth rattle. He catches himself.

But the man is fast. Shockingly fast: A blade is already drawn and arcing down.

Omar snatches the man’s wrist and lands on his own hip. The man bears down on Omar and that’s his mistake because Omar rolls to dislodge the weight and before the man knows it Omar’s pressed the knife-wielding hand into the man’s own chest.

A body lands on top of him — another passenger, this one holding the club — and five more gunshots buck before the stillness returns and the persistent chugging of the locomotive is audible again.

Omar stands, the gun smoke purple with enchantment coiling at the top of the car. Blood splatter covers the blue wallpaper, giving the golden roses patterned across it a carnivorous appearance.

“Now just what in the deathless hell was that?” Omar says.

Feroina, her right shoulder hanging at an unnatural angle, rolls over body after body of the fallen passengers with her feet.

“This one’s Maynard Bowles,” she says. Everyone still standing can hear the pop of her tendons as she thrusts her shoulder back into place.

“Maynard?” Omar looks down at the corpse. He now recognizes the dead bounty hunter from one of their many card games together.

“Renate ‘ja Salton, over here,” one of Omar’s ladies says.

“I don’t recognize this one,” another of his ladies calls, “but he broke my fucking wrist.” She shifts her gun to her better hand and adds two more bullets to the dead man’s skull.

“They’re all bounty hunters,” Feroina says. She rubs her shoulder.

Omar tries his hardest. He really does. But he can’t keep the grin off his face.

“She’s good, ain’t she?” he says.

His ladies turn to him. “Who?” one asks.

“Why,” Omar says, “my big sister.”

Feroina’s frigid glare could freeze a volcano. But Omar can’t contain himself.

He laughs.

Ansley swallows her cackle down: That dandy fuck is almost hers.