Albert DuCarmont

Albert DuCarmont is a man who keeps his head down and his fists ready. As the bouncer and handyman at the Silk Rose, Never’s rough-and-tumble saloon and brothel, he’s seen just about every kind of trouble a lawless frontier can offer. Drunken brawls, sore-loser gamblers, men who think “no” isn’t an answer — Albert handles them all with the same steady, unshakable presence. He isn’t the fastest gun or the sharpest tongue, but he is strong, reliable, and not easily rattled.

Yet, despite his simple outlook, Albert isn’t blind. There’s something wrong about Never, something that prickles at the edges of his instincts. He’s worked in plenty of towns, but nowhere else have shadows seemed too dark, or whispers carried from empty rooms. He’s seen men walk into the night and never come back—but no one seems to grieve them. He’s heard laughter in the Silk Rose that didn’t belong to any living throat.

Albert doesn’t have a name for what’s wrong with Never, and he isn’t a superstitious man, but he keeps an iron nail in his pocket and a Bible under his bed. Just in case.