The sun was rising over Suvar, peeking from behind the immeasurably tall holy Blue Sky Peak.<br/>The steppe wind came to lash the city mercilessly, as he always did at dawn. Coming from its own nightly abode in the south in order to replace the Northern wind - which resided in the Northern Forest and chilled the city's streets almost to the freezing point during the night - the Southern wind wasn't in the mood to be merciful. It brought heat, yes, but it also brought dry air, filled with sand from the desert, which was laying over there, right beyond the thin stretch of steppes. It made the unwary choke, removed themoisture from the aire, and lashed unprotected flesh.<br/><br/>But with the Southern Wind clearing the sky, the sun was going to peak soon enough. People were soon going to be able to show in the streets with only some silks on them, and the hardier (or less fortunate) souls went with even less. Indeed, some of them were already out, dealing with the cleaning of the city's wastes, extinguishing the night lanterns at the crossroads, and other tasks seen as necessary by the inhabitants. The lanterns were,of course, meant to attract wandering spirits to a crossroad, from which they couldn't leave before the sun destroyed them.<br/><br/>The cleaning would be less nasty if it didn't include bodies, but it often did. The untouchable caste of the Cleaners had more or less gotten used to it.<br/>This time, however, even the jaded cleaner Jahrad almost threw up. What stopped him was the fact that had he done so, he'd have needed to clean it himself.<br/>And while it was his job to clean the human waste, he wasn't about to add to his work.<br/>Instead, he rushed off to call the guards of the court, cursing under his breath. He had a feeling that they wouldn't be able to show the same level of restraint as him...<br/>As it turned out, he was right.<br/>The body looked like it had exploded from the inside out. And it took them quite a bit of searching before they started finding the head...here and there.<br/><br/>After getting the written report of the guards, and Jahrad's testimony, the judge cursed under his breath as well. This district was his first appointment and he really needed to leave a good impression!<br/>But this murder here? It couldn't be passed off as "accident". It was obviously occult of nature, and those were hard to investigate. And not uncovering it would leave a huge black spot on his chances to grow in the civil service!<br/>So he decided to call for an old favor.