Something like a smile made the corners of his mouth twitch. What was that funny, awful, untranslatable word Astrid taught him? A word that meant a buddy you brought on a prison break so you could eat him?

You are losing your marbles, Fish.

Fisha looked around conspiratorially, inching closer to Kennet, turning his back to create privacy. His hand came out of his pocket and the fingers uncurled.

Kennet’s blood went cold for an instant, then he burned hot all over.

In the boy’s palm were three teeth capped with gold.

“Where did you get those?” Kennet whispered automatically. He already knew. He’d toured the camp’s warehouses and workshops and seen the evil hoards of extracted gold teeth. Bins of them alongside piles of spectacles, heaps of jewelry, watches and other confiscated wealth. A special guard was posted around this grotesque booty and the officers were in a quandary about to whom it should be turned over.

And yet Fisha—clever, cunning, wily Fisha, managed to get past the guard and get a piece of the treasure.

“You little pirate,” Kennet said, now in a quandary of his own. Maybe if the teeth came from the jaw of a Nazi, he could justify them as trophies of war. But they came from prisoners. Fisha’s comrades. It was entirely disrespectful, almost sacrilegious to pilfer such things.

But was it? Really?

I’ll be leaving here soon. Where will Fisha go? Where will he be sent? What will become of him? He has no family. He has no money. He owns nothing. How much is the gold in these teeth worth? A couple bucks? Couple hundred bucks? It’ll be more than others have. It’ll give him a head start others don’t.

Let him keep it. Otherwise, the gold just ends up God knows where. In a government’s treasury. Or the pocket of some corrupt punk. Or a collector with obscene taste.

War blows the rules to shit.

To the victor go the spoils.

Let him.

He crouched down and closed the boy’s fingers over the three gold teeth, then shut that loaded fist up tight between his hands.

“Molodets,” he said, looking in Fisha’s eyes. “Good boy. You keep them. Keep them safe.” He wished he knew the word for secret. He freed a hand and drew pinched fingers across his lips, pressed a palm over his mouth and shook his head firmly.

No tell. Silence. You can count on me.

Fisha’s eyes narrowed above a tight smile. “Fuck Hitler.”

“Fuck Hitler. And fuck Hildur. This is the golden proof that breaks the curse of the elven queen. This will show where you’ve been.”

Commotion and chaos from within one of the barracks.

“Hangman’s coming,” O’Hara said.

Ingle closed his eyes and his forehead briefly touched Kennet’s shoulder. “Pescado, I can’t take this anymore.”