CW: sexism and misogyny, unhealthy relationships.

As Annie slips into the club, she grins at Robert, all trepidation and excitement. She hardly disturbs the velvet curtains with her passing, so their weight surprises him. He pushes at the fabric to force his way in.

The atmosphere is muggy and heavy, teasing immediate sweat from Robert’s brow as he takes in the dimly lit booths upholstered in blood-red leather, punctuated with brass studs. Naked bulbs hang perilously close to the barwoman’s head as she pours expensive vodka into glasses frosted with ice. Finally, Robert dares to look at the people—suits and cocktail dresses, they’re all beautiful, and somewhere in the crowd a glimpse of a mask made of turquoise feathers.

Robert slips his arm around Annie, casting circles on her hip and savouring the sheen of her new red dress. For a moment, his heart skips with love for her, something he had thought lost long ago. They have lived orthogonal lives for so long that Robert only knows how to use her. For sex, companionship, conversation—and in exchange, he pays for everything. But tonight they lean on the bar, ordering drinks in silence, gestures enough for them to make decisions together. She kisses him heavily, urgently, whilst they wait, then shoots back her vodka, with a coy moue daring Robert to do the same.

A figure approaches them from the crowd, hunched and with an uneven gait, wearing a crumpled dark green velvet suit, the twists of their body rendering them genderless. A smooth pale green mask hides their features and they carry a clipboard under one arm.

Their voice is liquid, calming and without an accent. “Welcome to The Talbot, Mr. and Mrs. Sharlto. Thank you for providing your forms. I must insist on our house rules being followed, with no exceptions. Membership is immediately forfeit for any breaches.

“All exchanges are to be notarised and witnessed by a Flenser, with their fee taken in advance of the transaction.

“The anonymity of the Flenser is sacred. You may not touch the Flenser at any time, nor question them about their identity. We are our masks, for the cut cares not for the flesh.”

Annie giggles at the ceremony of it all, smiling at Robert with a glee he had all but forgotten the sight of.

The Flenser continues: “And finally, you are required to return at the end of your agreed trade period. Breaches will not be tolerated, and the sanctions are most severe.”

Annie’s smile fades as she sees Robert’s jaw lock. Only he read the contract completely. He’s still not sure the Sutures—the Society-endorsed bailiffs—are legal, or even real. But no mind, he simply won’t make a trade he can’t commit to. He asks, “What if we want to do the cutting ourselves?”

“It’s not that sort of club, sir.”

The answer does not satisfy Robert—does that mean they could at another club? Is it too dangerous to attempt? Or simply distasteful to this crowd of sophisticates?—and he frowns as the mask looks back and forth between them, waiting for more questions.

The Flenser offers the clipboard. Robert signs, though he is unsettled by the lithe feminine hand holding the clipboard and the rough thick-fingered one offering the pen.

“Enjoy your evening, Mr. and Mrs. Sharlto.”

• • • •

Annie sparkles as they navigate the crowd. It’s a routine they perfected years ago; Robert is merciless in excavating every fragment of value from a network. Tonight she is wild, unpredictable, switching from flattering intimate insights to knife-edged barbs without warning, charming every new face they meet with ease.

Her green eyes sparkle in the shadows, her black hair lustrous and flowing like a river across her pale shoulders. The warmth of her kiss on his cheek lingers as she leaves him to approach a pair of women with steel hair, silver jewellery and elegant black dresses. Robert notices how one of the two—slim, with high cheekbones and a natural grace despite her age—openly stares, daring him to flirt.

He turns back to his companion, a publisher, who stands under a bulb so the light carves black absences from his eyes. Robert finds himself drifting off script, suddenly trying to explain his role as a gatekeeper for a numinous and protean world. How he communes with the god, Wealth, who manifests as vast datasets of the perception of value, high-frequency transactions, and continuous creation from nothing, for those able to speak to their deity. Robert renders the surreal tangible, parsing the divine through thresholds and slices until it becomes a single number in an individual’s bank account.

The publisher, naturally, finds a story in it. But it is his story, a quest of discovery, pulling the rarest diamonds from a pile of slush. He compares himself to Prometheus, bringing the whisperings of the gods to the free market. He compares Robert to Sisyphus, noble in his commitment to the necessary and quotidian.

They call a Flenser, this one preternaturally tall, carrying the suit and a steel mask with slim neon tubes accenting their features with an easy panache, who witnesses the contract: one week, a sense of direction in exchange for certainty. The knife catches the light in tight green whorls across the blade, but otherwise looks like a cheap chef’s knife, with a black plastic handle. Robert doesn’t feel a thing as ten seconds are cut from his life; the publisher clearly feels nothing either. Yet they both shudder as the blade passes through their bodies without sensation.

The Flenser speaks with a playful tone: “It is only strange the first time.”

It isn’t until the trade is complete that Robert realises he wants to understand why he hates the publisher so much.

• • • •

I would have lived as Annie forever until I met Suzanne. I see now how shallow I had become, but she reached out to me to offer a lifeline. And she looked like a queen standing in the low light, every inch of her age on display, daring beauty to forsake her.

“I’m pleased you came,” she told me. “It doesn’t matter that you brought him, it won’t change anything. He’s not the type.”

I felt different just standing in front of her, already free, as she told me all the secrets of the Talbot. “The menagerie is just the start. Some are here for the basement, if they have nothing left to lose. There are consortiums that trade with other societies—multinational deals that take years to negotiate—if you want to turn it into a job.”

I asked her, “What do you do?”

“Carla and I are part of a private group, very select. A lot of the time we trade at home.”

“Where do you get the knives? What about your Flenser?”

“A knife is easy to buy, like anything here. We take it in turns to make the cuts. It’s only a secret here because no one trusts each other.”

Carla leaned over to whisper in my ear, “I’ll take him off your hands for a week if you want. If you consent?”

“What do you mean?” I replied.

“Give me your love for him, and your body. You can have mine. Do you know how to play the piano? Suzanne is the most wonderful painter, if you’d like to try.”

I was so scared to say yes, somehow afraid that giving myself what I wanted would only disappoint me. But I did.

• • • •

As they agreed, Robert doesn’t tell Annie what he traded. Low-risk transactions only, no real capital at risk—it’s a game, something to revitalise them.

He spots her new ears on the third day when she tucks her hair behind one whilst doing the Times crossword. The new ear is wide and drooping with a fat teardrop lobe distorted from years of heavy earrings—Annie never had hers pierced. It is grotesque, and she is suddenly ugly to him, even when her hair falls back down and she looks like she always has.

Annie takes long hikes into the new forest that week—something she’s always hated—but Robert can’t see anything different about her legs. He offers to take time off work to join her, but she is already halfway out the door, lacing hiking boots he’s never seen before.

He thinks about those boots—when she had time to buy them, if he should get his own pair, if she’ll want them next week or if she’ll come back to him with photos of the forest’s wild horses or hikers from the trail—as he drives to work on the A13 to the Dartford Crossing. The pylons bend and coil to follow the road and keep him bound under cables and thrumming electricity.

Crossing the suspension bridge, he feels a sudden desire to cut the cables holding the towers in place. A Flenser’s blade held straight-armed out of the window, marvels of civil engineering shivering then collapsing into the road as he passes. On the riverbank behind him is a dock with two barges moored; ahead is a warehouse complex. He is crossing between two counties that forgot to be different.

He only realises he’s come off the motorway at the wrong junction when he finds himself driving down a narrow winding road with high sides of carved chalk. Lost, he takes more turns onto wooded lanes but sees no buildings at all. Eventually he arrives at an abandoned quarry, a crystalline blue-green lake at its base. Sheer walls of hewn chalk loom over the pool, casting the space in shadow, and he can see the testaments of heavy machinery clawing aggregates from the earth to create buildings for multinational construction companies. He realises he is in a sacred space, a tangible artefact of the numinous world he prays to.

He strips, leaves everything in the car, and walks to the lake, unsure how deep it is.

The water is shockingly cold as he dives in.

• • • •

I wanted to go back to Robert, at least to say goodbye, but I never found the time. After a week of painting and playing preludes on Carla’s grand piano, which she kept in an otherwise empty room with pristine white walls in her beautiful Hampstead house, overlooking the Heath, I wanted more. I learnt it from the best, after all.

Instead I wept, openly sobbed, in Suzanne’s embrace as we returned our lives to each other. She held me in those strong arms, waiting patiently for my turmoil to exhaust itself. Then she invited me to join the Consent.

They couldn’t resist a little ritual, asking me to wear green and booking out Titu in Green Park for my introduction. Suzanne wore a white eye mask that did nothing to conceal her identity and a beautiful green silk trouser suit. She presented me with the knife, which I returned to her, to symbolise our trust. Then they embraced me one by one, my new sisters.

I was the seventeenth member of a group of all ages, nationalities, ethnicities, and faiths. I sat for dinner between Adì, a Nigerian ballet dancer barely twenty years old, and Qadira, a stately Kuwaiti matron exiled by the wars decades ago. We laughed like only intimate conspirators can.

I tried Adi’s life eventually and found it gruelling. The discipline required, the endurance she needed to survive every single day, was humbling. Even as her toes bled and another director consigned her dark skin to the chorus, she was full of hope.

• • • •

This time, Annie holds the curtain for him as they enter The Talbot. There is a frisson between them that Robert can’t define, and they have made love several times this week, something much more honest than all the fucking they’ve done across the preceding years. Annie is mercurial, moving with a new, languid ease, and she kisses Robert slowly, like a lover at the end of an affair, before moving away into the club. He catches a glimpse of steel hair, loose over toned shoulders, before heading to the bar to meet the publisher.

The publisher is waiting with a Flenser wearing a white mask, plain except for subtle striations of pink, and they complete their transaction. It doesn’t feel any different to Robert; he wants more. So when the publisher says, “I’ve found something further in. Do you want to see it?” he agrees without hesitation.

They pass through room after room—Robert had no idea the club was so big—where people trade their joy, two young men agree to swap their griefs, and a paraplegic weeps as his wife swaps places with him.

The publisher takes him to a riveted metal door in the corner of a back room, the other side of which is an open yard ringed with cages of all sizes. There are exploding clouds of tiny colourful birds, dogs and cats, horses, sage-looking monkeys with tufts of white hair, and even, Robert realises with a gasp, a tiger, which paces its cage ceaselessly. In the middle a Flenser with a mask of teeth works at a table, a small crowd watching as he finishes giving a fat old man a dog’s nose.

The old man sits up and sniffs heavily, then bursts into laughter. “It’s incredible, truly amazing! You—” He points at a woman in the crowd “—Have a eucalyptus lip balm in your bag, under the mints.”

The woman unclasps her bag and produces the lip balm, and everyone applauds. Behind them, the Flenser leads the Labrador to an empty cage where it turns to reveal cracked blood vessels on its newly bulbous nose. It sniffs at the floor, its eyebrows furrowing in sadness and confusion.

Robert needs no more convincing. Together, he and the publisher—they have an unspoken agreement, he feels, never to share names—study the cages in turn. The publisher finds a python and claims its skin without hesitation. Robert studies every animal in the room until he settles on a cotton-topped tamarin, its black face accented by tufts of stark white hair. Its long tail is nimble and strong.

• • • •

Robert has found it difficult to relax in the office since discovering The Talbot. Previously the open plan space and bright lighting invigorated him, with its easy view of ceaseless activity. But now he can only see the scuffs on the orange and green accent walls, the dishwasher-faded branding on all the mugs. And what happened to all the forks?

He is stirring his tea, lost deep in a reverie of last night at the club, the ting-ting-ting of spoon on ceramic the jangle of a handbag strap belonging to an immaculate doll of a woman who wanted the tiger’s body. How merciless she was, lashing out at shadows with a long-withheld fury.

A sharp gasp snaps him back to the room, where he sees Melanie from HR, her mouth open in shock. She grabs his arms and pulls him into the back stairwell that no one uses, shoving him through the door as he tries to resist. She snaps at him, “What the hell are you doing? Put that away, you idiot!”

Robert realises, with a twist of his stomach, that his tail has escaped his trousers and is dancing behind him playfully. He says, “Sorry, I’ll need to . . .” and points at his belt. She nods urgently so he unbuckles, opens his trousers, and stuffs the tail back in place quickly. He starts to say as he finishes, “Look, I can explain, really.”

Melanie says, “I’ve never seen you at the club, I had no idea.”

“The Talbot?”

“Oh, no. Blackheath?” Robert shakes his head. “Different location then. It’s a lovely tail, really. I’ve been dying to tell someone as well.” She unbuttons her blouse quickly, before Robert can react, and opens it to reveal white plumage across her chest, accenting her brown skin perfectly.

She asks, “Have you got time for a drink after work? I never get to talk about it.”

Robert nods dumbly, and soon the naked joy in Melanie’s eyes infects him and he smiles.

• • • •

We flew from branch to branch, catching the wind on flared wings. Our claws were strong, our curved beaks nimble, as we shelled prickly horse chestnuts and cracked the nuts inside for their sweet flesh. Our bright green plumage hid us perfectly amongst the fresh spring leaves of London’s plane trees. The city is the perfect home for us.

We flew as one body across the capital, bombing along rich West London roads, soaring up roof tiles and into the inner sanctums of the rich and powerful. We chattered in their private orchards and gnawed all their fruit. We watched them as they lived their tiny lives of opulence.

When we grew tired of that we sat across Hammersmith Bridge, resting our wings and watching the river pass by. One of us broke free then, succumbing to instincts. The rest of us let ourselves go, scattering across the city to live like animals, all human interests forgotten.

• • • •

Robert starts the affair with Melanie the week after Annie asks him to call her Suzanne. Having spent weeks not knowing how to talk to his wife, being constantly surprised by the things she says, it cuts the last tie between them, the hard z of the name like the snip of shears.

Shortly after she changed her name, Suzanne found Robert in the kitchen. She was naked and beautiful and confidently pulled his clothes off to fuck him on the kitchen table. He loved every second of it even as he realised his marriage was over.

He emails Melanie first thing the next morning. Come out with me tonight, I’ll show you mine if you show me yours. Drinks turn into dinner turn into flashing his snakeskin in the car as she tells him she’s traded her inhibitions for impatience and then they are in her house and so hungry for each other and he feels the blaze of her across his cold-blooded scales that cover him from neck to toe.

He wakes wrapped around her, holding her tight to take her warmth. Somehow, he knows Annie has left already, that he wasn’t missed last night, and he whispers in Melanie’s ear, “Come with me to The Talbot this weekend.”

She kisses his hand, rubbing the smooth scales across her face, lost in the sensation of his new body.

• • • •

They told me their final secret months later. It was never about bodies or ownership. Suzanne and I had grown so close—we had shared each other’s lives after all—that I had thought it was just love between us. She was more than witness to my secrets, she kept them as well. She had fucked Robert like a stranger yet loved him like a wife. She had taken on part of me as I had left it behind and it was as I kept trading, and sharing lives with these beautiful women, that the change overtook me.

What are we but the sum of our choices? An experiment in causality that we claim as our own? A long list of triumphs and regrets? What if we have the same entries on our lists, the same moments written down at the same time that bind us and make us powerful and full of love? Are we one, or apart, or something new?

I think perhaps I never feared the knife’s edge, not truly, because Suzanne and Carla do not. I chose them once, and I cannot be sure I chose anything on my own ever again.

Sometimes I wake late at night, to a world of moonlight and silence, the uncanny long hours that slip past while we dream, when my thoughts keep me from sleep.

Will I ever know who to thank?

• • • •

Long after Robert and Melanie have exhausted the potential of the menagerie’s pleasures, of all fleshes, when they are parading the halls of The Talbot, talking to everyone there in search of people they envy, who might offer a trade of interest, they meet the publisher again.

They are in the library, naturally, filled with couples sat in armchairs brokering deals, a pair of Flensers awaiting their call from one corner. The publisher has found a spot where the shadows once again carve dark shapes from his eyes. He smiles when he recognises Robert and offers a hug like they are old friends.

He quickly charms Melanie—Robert can see it in the dip of her hips—as they share their experiences since their first night. “It’s hard to remember what I was like before,” he says. “We really used to live as just one thing? You know, I’ve been buying different books, so many bestsellers. I’ve never felt so in touch with fiction.”

Robert bristles at his self-importance. “Your big takeaway from all this is you’re better at reading books?”

Melanie chides him with a gentle slap, already comfortable in the role of partner. The publisher just laughs and says, “I suppose so. It sounds a lot more impressive in the office.” He adds, “What about you two?”

He’s lost a wife but gained Melanie; his personal financial trades are showing large profits; he has wooed high-net-worth clients from rival firms with ease; he has distilled and optimised himself to the best of his ability; he doesn’t feel any different. He shrugs.

Melanie says, “I want more. I want to feel it all. I don’t just want to be me. What if I could be insanely rich, then homeless? Or live underwater? Could I be a kid again? What does it feel like to know you’re dying?”

“How horrible.” The publisher frowns at the idea.

“Don’t you want to know what it feels like? Maybe you could learn how to make it easier. Or help other people better.”

Robert says, “No.”

The publisher smirks at the easy dismissal and says, “I’d rather leave at least one mystery to be solved.”

Towards the end of the evening, when they have toured the club and found nothing they want to acquire beyond an old fashioned and a dirty martini, Robert finally finds the moment to ask Melanie, “What if we swap bodies?”

She looks long and hard at Robert, first his face then across his body. Robert has kept in shape and is strong and fit. Handsome enough that it would be a fair trade. He has studied every inch of Melanie, the curve of her hips, the sheen of her dark skin in the moonlight, the fullness of her lips and the delicate bowls of her clavicles. He hopes she wants to own her desire as much as he does.

She waves for a Flenser without breaking his gaze. She whispers in his ear, “No one at work, treat it like it’s your own, and we get four days on our own.”

Short of breath, his heart racing, Robert agrees.

• • • •

The first three days are not what Robert expects. His dreams of exploring her and inhabiting a sensual paradise are tempered almost immediately by his awareness of a tampon, which no amount of fidgeting can make comfortable. Melanie drives them home in Robert’s body—Robert forgot to include caveats for the car insurance, amongst a hundred other things—and laughs easily as she talks him through everything he needs to do as her period finishes. “It should only be two more days, you’ll get a few good days. Really, if you want to know what it’s like to be a woman . . .”

They swap houses so he explores her wardrobe, fumbling with bra clasps and searching for anything that feels right, eventually settling on an ankle-length dress with billowy sleeves. He shifts and stretches through cramps, inexplicable headaches, and a queasy bubbling in his stomach. Finally, as Melanie promised, on the third day it passes. He takes a long shower, soaping her body and rubbing his hands all over it. He masturbates several times until he feels sore and guilty. He looks at the body in the mirror from every angle.

That night he puts on his favourite pink lace underwear of hers, then her electric blue dress, tighter around his legs so he has to walk carefully to avoid tripping. He settles on ballerinas after a few abortive attempts in her heels. Then he takes the train into London, to Brixton where they never normally go, and floats around bars. He sits alone and studies the men, who study her back. He searches for anyone that gives him that spark, a rush of desire. He waits for hours, batting back endless advances with—what he begins to realise is—a deeply masculine inflexibility. Not all of his rebuttals are received gracefully. Maybe he was expecting to have Melanie’s desires, he realises, as he downs the rest of his pint and goes home.

• • • •

When her turn came to be the Flenser, the blade was not heavy; it was the only thing she could feel.

She wore an emerald green trouser suit with a royal blue shirt. The delicate weave of the fabric captured rainbow hues so she seemed like a peacock’s feather, drawing all eyes to her golden mask, its smile balanced between wry amusement and sorrow.

She became a piece on the board, a rook waiting for the right moment to strike. The players all ignored her until they were ready to make their move. She could see which ones understood they were at risk as well in this game.

The night fared well. A man with myths to tell offered a whole day in a fit of largesse. It tasted wild and inconsolable, like tarragon and spice.

• • • •

On the fourth day, he goes home—to his home. It’s mid-morning when he unlocks the front door and walks into an empty house. He’s wearing the dress and underwear again. He waits in the kitchen until the door opens again and Melanie appears, his body sweating, his face flushed, as she drops the gym bag and squash racket on the floor. She draws a large glass of water and drinks it down before she speaks: “You’re early. You know the blue and pink are clashing, right? You want the white blouse and the black knee-length skirt.”

He had a whole speech ready about how she tricked him, made the deal in bad faith, stole his life, but it sticks in his throat.

Melanie says, “It was going to be a surprise, but I’ve planned us a special night tomorrow. If it feels like a mean trick, remember how it feels next month, maybe?”

Robert watches his own hand caress his arm, the gentle slap on his shoulder. He smirks back at himself. He smells his own sweat, sees the tone in his pectorals. He grabs his own neck and pulls himself in for a kiss, which she returns, until she realises he’s not going to stop, that his hands are roaming everywhere and tugging at his shorts and grabbing his cock, rubbing it up and down.

When Melanie says, “No,” Robert doesn’t listen. He presses harder until she grabs his wrists and pulls them apart. He’s suddenly helpless, struggling to free himself, knowing exactly the strength he’s fighting against. She holds him easily, pushing him back firmly and carefully. Robert feels a shock of fear even as he watches his own penis dangling free, limp and dismal. He stops fighting, waits for Melanie to release him. When she does, he steps back and clumsily reaches round to undo the dress and tug at the panties. He yanks them off as she pulls his shorts back on.

She’s walking away, out of the kitchen and towards his bedroom as she says, “Get out of here, Robert. Don’t call me, I’ll see you at the club.”

Stood in his own kitchen, in only a pink lacy bra, he feels ridiculous. Shame will only come later. He grabs her clothes and as he pulls the pants back on, he sees spots of blood staining the gusset.

• • • •

After a few days of furious drinking and smoking—nothing he wouldn’t do to his own body in the circumstances—he is hungover and clumsy as he fights his way through the curtain once more. He found the blouse and skirt and now wears them with a pair of trainers, his feet sore from everything else in her wardrobe. He’s seen no one since the other night, choosing to extract his vitriol on her body. He’s left the new sex toys ordered online—and already experimented with—for her to find on the bed along with flowers, champagne, and chocolates.

He finds her in the library, waiting in a high-backed armchair, the publisher sat behind her. She calls over a waiter to order him an old fashioned, and a Flenser to complete their deal.

He asks her, “What did you do with my body then?”

“You’re really fit, you know that? I swam in the sea, went climbing, cycling. The first two days, I drove to Wales. There’s this centre with a huge artificial lake and wave generator. Incredible, this massive concrete block they force up and down the water. I’ve always wanted to learn to surf. I’ve never felt strong enough before.” His drink arrives, so he busies himself with a sip as she asks him, “What did you do?”

“I tried on a lot of clothes.” She smiles kindly, where Robert knows a few days ago she would have laughed without restraint. “And, well, I went to a bar on my own.”

“How did that go?”

“I guess I thought having your body would mean I was into men, for some reason. Mainly, I had to get rid of all the perverts.”

“Is that all?”

“I think I ruined your pink panties.”

She shrugs, then nods at the Flenser: “Shall we?”

The Flenser is barely five feet tall, the knife and green suit rendering them sinister despite the softness of their voice. “Robert Sharlto, for your breach of the agreed terms, sanctions are required.”

“What breach? What is th—?”

“Four days separation were agreed. For your breach we have inquired with the other party and they have declined to pursue the matter. As such, the Suture are not invoked. However, Club statutes require me to issue you with a four-week ban.”

“Four weeks?!”

“Ms. Williamson has also requested a restraining provision against you. As such, after your ban, you will be required to call in advance of attending the club, with permission to be granted only at Ms. Williamson’s consent.”

“What the fuck, Melanie?”

She has already learned how to project his full gravitas: “Same rules, anybody.”

The Flenser takes their copper-green knife and cuts Melanie free of Robert’s body. He feels her floating, separate and free, as they floated together a week ago. They look at Robert and say, “I would prefer not to have to restrain you.” Robert acquiesces, gritting his teeth as he slips free and the warm air of the club buffets him until he is slotted back into his own body. His hangover vanishes, replaced by the satisfying stiffness of muscles well-used.

Melanie coughs and coughs and glares at Robert. “Fuck up your own shell next time.” She takes the pen the Flenser is offering, signs the paperwork and stands. She says, “It’s a real shame you had to fuck it up, Robert,” and walks away.

Robert stares until finally he registers the pen hovering in his face. Before he can take the paperwork, he sees the fingers holding it, a familiar pale quality to the skin, and the slight curve of the ring finger that he knows almost as well as his own. Once, years ago, he put a ring on that hand, never expecting it to come off. And now it holds a restraining order for another woman.

“Annie?” He looks up at the mask, an elfin blue-sequinned one with high cheekbones and a pointed chin, wondering how she has ended up so low. Shrunken and lifeless and bonded to the duties of a Flenser. Was it his fault? How did he fail her so badly? “Annie, is it really you? That thing with Melanie, it’s over. It’s just because you vanished.”

“Please sign.”

“Will you please talk to me? What did you swap? Can I trade with you? Your story for mine—that’s a fair trade.”

“All paperwork must be completed, or you will be in breach of contract and the Suture will be informed.”

“I don’t believe it. Annie, I really need to know you’re ok.” The Flenser pulls the hand back as he reaches for it, which draws him further in, his hand brushing the soft velvet of the suit and then the sharp edges of the mask. He grabs at the edge of it, feeling the sequins slice into his fingertips as he pulls it off the Flenser’s face.

He sees what’s underneath for less than a second. It’s a tormented waxwork of a face, the features of many people melting into each other, the skin a roiling mass of bulges and fibrous lines pushing the surface like worms. Its lower lip is missing, the lower gums revealed, with two black, rotting stumps of teeth. The eyes are the only element not in flux and he does not know them—they are crystal blue where Annie’s are green—but they are at peace.

Then Annie’s hand cracks him with a single hammer blow on the temple, and there is nothing.

• • • •

There are more breaches than she ever imagined. Adjudications are made ceaselessly, the reckless bought back into line with a flick of the blade. The Consent have no need for it, but she must take her turn at the Society as well, for it agreed terms with the Consent a long time ago.

They face this task together, united in the inevitable butchery. “It is not our choice,” they repeat every time they cleave limb from body. “It doesn’t have to be like this,” they whisper as whimpering is cut short by a heavy chop.

She is glad of the mask as she is called in to assist a trainee with a judgement. She can weep privately as she guides his hand through skin and muscle and blood and aspiration and joy and horror and loss and memory and the multitude of infinities that live inside a breath. She can retain her humanity even as she strips it from someone else.

She doesn’t recognise Robert at first. He’s just flesh being used in a lesson, until they turn the blade to his essences. No one ever wanted things quite like him, and his inward-looking lusts still taste the same to her, that crisp herbal flourish, like mouthwash and smoke as he climbed into bed late at night. Now that she has seen him, she can’t look anywhere but at his eyes. She has to remember his every reaction, she owes him that much.

The publisher doesn’t hesitate, whatever comradery the two of them shared easily traded for power. Annie never wanted power, but she cannot forsake her duty—the terms of the Consent’s agreement are unambiguous—or she will end up on the table herself. And the loss to the Consent would be brutal, it would rip chunks from each of them in turn.

She guides the trainee’s knife—she remembers him, a storyteller obsessed with becoming myth—careful to study only his grip and technique.

The body on the table, Robert, pleads, he calls out, “I’m sorry, I’ll pay anything she wants, I’ll give it all to her. We have to be able to reach a deal, come on you bastards, fucking tell me what you want!”

It reminds her of a nightmare she had once, of a life one of the sisters lived perhaps.

Together, they cut.

• • • •

Robert wakes up in a room with green walls, sat on a low metal stool. The chimera with Annie’s hand stands in front of him, its mask back on, its knife sheathed at its hip. He slowly recompiles his horror at the sight of those faces tumbling through bone. It says, “The anonymity of the Flenser is sacred. We are our masks, for the cut cares not for the flesh.”

Behind him he hears a familiar voice say, “You never push the knife. Remember, it isn’t a knife, but the transaction made manifest. It will guide your hand, and if you try to force it, it will become exactly what you make it—just a knife.”

He can’t believe what he’s hearing, that Annie can sound so dispassionate about cutting up her own husband.

He places the preposterous tone of the publisher immediately: “What should I take first?”

“That’s for you to decide. Forfeiture means no terms; the only goal is liquidation of the asset. I’d start small though, don’t rush it.”

A figure in a green velvet suit walks into his line of vision. It stands in front of him, then kneels down, so its tacky ink-black mask is level with his face. The publisher lifts his mask and says, “I guess I am Charon after all. Don’t suppose you’ve got an obol? I hear you’re going to feel this for a very long time, so maybe I was right about you as well.”

Robert tries to roar and scream and lash out and rip the stool from the floor and rage at the endless green, but he simply can’t move. The breach is his.

The publisher starts with a toenail, which he places on a silver platter offered by the Flenser Annie. He parses Robert’s left foot into fifty slices. Robert is shocked at first to discover it doesn’t hurt, then again when he realises he can still feel his foot. It has the feel of several people walking at once, a strange bubbling continuous sensation.

Robert thinks it is a mercy when he feels his terror extracted. Until he watches as it is passed into the chimera before him, and he is hit by a raw blast of something too intense to name. The chimera lives in agony, which it now shares with Robert intimately.

By a million more cuts, Robert finally passes beyond the threshold.