Sarafina

Mason is still astride his victim as Archie pulls a smoking stick from the flames, a charred worm of squirrel meat stuck to it like tar. Mason says to save what ammunition remains in case of emergency, and by that he means soldiers or thieves, not rabbits or squirrels. Behind him, Sarafina hums as she works over Mason’s body. The last of the Union soldiers have long moved on, finally clearing out of the God-forsaken Devil’s Punchbowl where those hypocrites kept so many of the freed slaves locked up.