“Waste of good food if you ask me,” Two Legs began, but the other yuan-ti guard slapped him on the side of the head hard enough to make Two Legs stumble.

“Blasphemer,” he muttered, and gave a slight bow to Scitheron. “He is young, and stupid. I would understand if you must tell the low priest of his transgression.”

At the mention of the priest, Two Legs clutched the hilt of his scimitar and began flickering his tongue wildly.

“That won’t be necessary,” Scitheron said. “This time. But Zehir hears all, half-ape. Remember that.” He could have had the guard executed, but they couldn’t spare an able-bodied snakeman, especially for so mild a blasphemy. Seeing the guard suitably chastened, Scitheron continued through the remnant of the walls, to find almost the entire population of the settlement gathered in a plaza, sharing a communal breakfast of whatever the elite abomination hunters-all three of them-had been able to gather in the forest. Once the abominations had been the shock forces of their sect, armed with swords and grasping coils that could crush the life from any enemy. But those left were a sad remnant.

“Scitheron.” The low priest approached, pure-white scales making her seem eerily ghostlike in the morning light. “Your chores are complete?”

“Yes, most low.”

“Good, good.” The low priest touched his shoulder and guided him to a corner of the courtyard, beneath the weathered remains of a statue that Scitheron, to his shame, could not begin to identify. The low priest looked around at the assembled crowd, only a few dozen yuan-ti, not even a stable breeding population, truth be told. Some years before, a group had gone in search of another branch of their sect, rumored to thrive in the east, but they had never returned.