“Piss on your assistant. They have our employer! That means they have my pay!”

Morveer could do nothing but grind his teeth as the prisoners were herded across the bridge and into the palace, the heavy gates tightly sealed behind them. “Damn it! The tower-house is no longer safe! We cannot return there!”

“An hour ago you couldn’t stand the thought of going back to that den of hypocrisy and erotic adventure.”

“But my equipment is there!”

“I doubt it.” Vitari nodded her spiky head towards the palace. “It’ll be with all the boxes they carried in there.”

Morveer slapped petulantly at the bare rafter by his head, winced as he took a splinter in his forefinger and was forced to suck it. “Damn and shitting blast!”

“Calm, Morveer, calm.”

“I am calm!” The sensible thing to do was undeniably to find a boat, to float silently up to Duke Salier’s palace, then past it and out to sea, writing off his losses, return to the orchard and train another assistant, leaving Murcatto and her imbecile Northman to reap the consequences of their stupidity. Caution first, always, but…

“I cannot leave my assistant behind in there,” he barked. “I simply cannot!”

“Why?”

“Well, because…” He was not sure why. “I flatly refuse to go through the trouble of instructing another!”

Vitari’s irritating grin had grown wider. “Fine. You need your girl and I need my money. You want to cry about it or work on a way in? I still say boat down the river to the north wall, then rope and grapple to the roof.”

Morveer squinted unhopefully towards the sheer stonework. “You can truthfully secure a grapple up there?”

“I could get a grapple through a fly’s arse. It’s you getting the boat into position that worries me.”

He was not about to be outdone. “I challenge you to find a more accomplished oarsman! I could hold a boat steady in a deluge twice as fierce, but it will not be needful. I can drive a hook into that stonework and anchor the boat against those rocks all night.”

“Good for you.”

“Good. Excellent.” His heart was beating with considerable urgency at the argument. He might not have liked the woman, but her competence was in no doubt. Given the circumstances he could not have selected a more suitable companion. A most handsome woman, too, in her own way, and no doubt every bit as firm a disciplinarian as the sternest nurse at the orphanage had been…

Her eyes narrowed. “I hope you’re not going to make the same suggestion you made last time we worked together.”

Morveer bristled. “There will be no repetition of that whatsoever, I can assure you!”

“Good. Because I’d still rather fuck a hedgehog.”

“You made your preferences quite clear on that occasion!” he answered shrilly, then moved with all despatch to shift the topic. “There is no purpose in delay. Let us find a vessel appropriate to our needs.” He took one last look down as he slithered back into the attic, and paused. “Who’s this now?” A single figure was striding boldly towards the palace gates. Morveer felt his heart sink even lower. There was no mistaking the flamboyant gait. “Cosca. Whatever is that horrible old drunkard about?”