(Scars do not appear to be cause of death –shock ... - Bad Request

Dak'kon and Grace nodded respectfully before we left.
Going out into Inner Curst during the day was like pulling the burlap sack off
the head of a Hive-born hooker: all the scars and warts and flavors of ugly
are there to behold, with a shock that would've given you second thoughts.
Worse really, because when it came to Curst I couldn't exactly dim the lights
to get through the ordeal.
A ramshackle guillotine had been proudly set up at the town square, blade
and basket stained with smears of scarlet. There was a rankness in the air
about it between the coppery tang of fresh blood and the scabby must of
old, and flies were fattening themselves on the callous justice of the people.
The Gate to Carceri squatted in the middle of the ward like a great
four-legged insect, black razorvine twined around its stone arches. Each one
was festooned with various skulls along its length, some spiny, others
horned, none of them human. They moaned quietly through their
eyesockets in the breeze.
In one alley, a ring of civilians pared away the hours by forming a circle
around a pair of trichas that snapped at each other with vicious beaks and
clawed with feet bound with plaits of barbed wire. In the corner a pair of
bleeding tricha corpses lay, necks slashed open and heads laying at odd
angles. More flies danced over their filmed-over eyes and entered and
exited their gaping beaks, ghostly silent against the background of cheers
and gamblers placing bets. In the evening the dead would be gutted and
carved for their meat.
Then there was Wernet.
He was burly, with a bestial strength to him like that of a rabid bear. His face
was scarred and creased with countless tales of violence, and his voice came
like gravel scraping over a seabed. "Wha' d'ya want, berk?"
"I've come to talk to you about Kyse, the dump caretaker."
"Aww, has the poor li'l man heard we was coming for his money?" He
scratched himself. "You go back and tell him he's givin' it up or he's a dead
man. Go on, now."
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