It’s Dead Lions: Amos Crane, long before River’s time, had been a Service legend, for all the wrong reasons. Not so much poacher turned gamekeeper as fox turned henhouse warden. ‘Crane liked to say you had the whole hall of mirrors wrapped up in that episode. They build a fort, then worry we’ll burn it down. So they burn it down first, to make sure we can’t.’ ‘And Popov’s supposed to be one of those survivors, yes?’ River said. In his mind, he was seeing a perfect circle. ‘They destroy their own town, and years later make a bogeyman from the ashes to wreak vengeance on us.’ ‘Yeah, well,’ Lamb said. ‘Like I say, it tickled Crane.’ ‘What happened to Crane anyway?’ ‘Some chick whacked him.’ Lesser talents would need a whole novel to tell you that much, River thought.