Morveer had other plans. “We should have a scheme for dividing such money as Murcatto has here—”

“No,” said Cosca, for some reason intensely irritated at the thought. “I say we wait.”

“This place is not safe. One of the entertainers could have been captured by the authorities, could even now be divulging its location.”

“Exciting, isn’t it? I say we wait.”

“Wait if you please, but I—”

Cosca whipped his knife out in one smooth motion. The blade whirred shining through the darkness and thumped, vibrating gently, into the wood no more than a foot or two from Morveer’s face. “A little gift of my own.”

The poisoner raised one eyebrow at it. “I do not appreciate drunks throwing knives at me. What if your aim had been off?”

Cosca grinned. “It was. We wait.”

“For a man of notoriously fickle loyalties, I find your attachment to a woman who once betrayed you… perplexing.”

“So do I. But I’ve always been an unpredictable bastard. Perhaps I’m changing my ways. Perhaps I’ve made a solemn vow to be sober, loyal and diligent in all my dealings from now on.”

Vitari snorted. “That’ll be the day.”

“And how long do we wait?” demanded Morveer.

“I suppose you’ll know when I say you can leave.”

“And suppose… I choose… to leave before?”

“You’re nothing like as clever as you think you are.” Cosca held his eye. “But you’re cleverer than that.”

“Everyone be calm,” snarled Vitari, in the most uncalming voice imaginable.

“I don’t take orders from you, you pickled remnant!”

“Maybe I need to teach you how—”

The warehouse door banged open and two figures burst through. Cosca whipped his sword from his stick, Vitari’s chain rattled, Day had produced a small flatbow from somewhere and levelled it at the doorway. But the new arrivals were not representatives of the authorities. They were none other than Shivers and Monza, both wet through, stained with dirt and soot and panting for breath as though they had been pursued through half the streets of Sipani. Perhaps they had.

Cosca grinned. “You need only mention her name and up she springs! Master Morveer was just now discussing how we should divide your money if it turned out you were burned to a cinder in the shell of Cardotti’s.”

“Sorry to disappoint you,” she croaked.

Morveer gave Cosca a deadly glare. “I am by no means disappointed, I assure you. I have a vested interested in your survival to the tune of many thousands of scales. I was simply considering… a contingency.”

“Best to be prepared,” said Day, lowering the bow and sucking the juice from her orange.

“Caution first, always.”

Monza lurched across the warehouse floor, one bare foot dragging, jaw muscles clenched tight against evident pain. Her clothes, which had not left too much to the imagination in the first instance, were badly ripped. Cosca could see a long red scar up one thin thigh, more across her shoulder, down her forearm, pale and prickly with gooseflesh. Her right hand was a mottled, bony claw, pressed against her hip as though to keep it out of sight.