The first half of this story takes place 1836 and opens in Virginia, sixty-one years after Reymen's story. The second half begins in Arkansas in 1868.
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Kateesha tied the cloak under her chin and gazed in the mirror. Her dark hair was piled high on her head. Golden earrings hung from her lobes, leftovers from the mistress of the plantation. Around her neck hung her Executioner medallion, worn like a badge to show the immortal world who they were. Malick had taken the idea from vampire lords of old, giving her and her brother in blood these necklaces long before they came to the colonies. It was a symbol of his own design, three interlocking circles that symbolized life, death, and blood, or something similar. Kateesha had forgotten the lecture, because she didn't care. She knew only that what had once been a symbol of servitude to her master was now something that instilled fear; the mark of an Executioner, the reminder of the coming punishment.