So it seemed. Friendly turned his back on Safety, clambered dumbly up onto his horse. “Look forwards.” But to what? Infinite possibilities? He felt panic gripping him. “Forwards all depends on which way you face. Which way should I face now?”

Cosca grinned as he turned his own mount about. “Making that choice is what life is. But if I may make a suggestion?”

“Please.”

“I will be taking the Thousand Swords—or those who have not retired on the plunder of Fontezarmo, at least, or found regular employment with the Duchess Monzcarro—down towards Visserine to help me press my claims on Salier’s old throne.” He unscrewed the cap of his flask. “My entirely righteous claims.” He took a swig and burped, blasting Friendly with an overpowering reek of strong spirits. “A title promised me by the King of Styria, after all. The city is in chaos, and those bastards need someone to show them the way.”

“You?”

“And you, my friend, and you! Nothing is more valuable to the ruler of a great city than an honest man who can count.”

Friendly took one last longing look back, the gatehouse already disappearing into the trees. “Perhaps they’ll start it up again, one day.”

“Perhaps they will. But in the meantime I can make noble use of your talents in Visserine. I have entirely rightful claims. Born in the city, you know. There’ll be work there. Lots of… work.”

Friendly frowned sideways. “Are you drunk?”

“Ludicrously, my friend, quite ludicrously so. This is the good stuff. The old grape spirit.” Cosca took another swig and smacked his lips. “Change, Friendly… change is a funny thing. Sometimes men change for the better. Sometimes men change for the worse. And often, very often, given time and opportunity…” He waved his flask around for a moment, then shrugged. “They change back.”

Happy Endings

Few days after they’d thrown him in there, they’d set up a gallows just outside. He could see it from the little window in his cell, if he climbed up on the pallet and pressed his face to the bars. A man might wonder why a prisoner would go to all that trouble to taunt himself, but somehow he had to. Maybe that was the point. It was a big wooden platform with a crossbeam and four neat nooses. Trapdoors in the floor so they only had to kick a lever to snap four necks at a go, easy as snapping twigs. Quite a thing. They had machines for planting crops, and machines for printing paper, and it seemed they had machines for killing folk too. Maybe that’s what Morveer had meant when he spouted off about science, all those months ago.

They’d hanged a few men right after the fortress fell. Some who’d worked for Orso, given some offence someone needed vengeance for. A couple of the Thousand Swords as well, must’ve stepped onto some dark ground indeed, since there weren’t many rules to break during a sack. But no one had swung for a long time now. Seven weeks, or eight. Maybe he should’ve counted the days, but what difference would counting ’em have made? It was coming, of that much he was sure.