“Orso’ll find out! He’ll find out!”

“Of course he will. When I throw him off his own terrace, if not before.”

“You’ll never do it! He’ll kill you!”

“He already did, remember? It didn’t stick.”

Veins stood out on Gobba’s neck as he struggled, but Friendly had him fast, for all his bulk. “You can’t beat him!”

“Maybe not. I suppose we’ll see. There’s only one thing I can tell you for sure.” She raised the hammer high. “You won’t.”

The head came down on his knuckles with a faintly metallic crunch—once, twice, three times. Each blow jarred her hand, sent pain shooting up her arm. But a lot less pain than shot up Gobba’s. He gasped, yelped, trembled, Friendly’s slack face pressed up against his taut one. Gobba jerked back from the anvil, his hand turning sideways on. Monza felt herself grinning as the hammer hissed down and crushed it flat. The next blow caught his wrist and turned it black.

“Looks worse even than mine did.” She shrugged. “Well. When you pay a debt, it’s only good manners to add some interest. Get the other hand.”

“No!” squealed Gobba, dribbling spit. “No! Think of my children!”

“Think of my brother!”

The hammer smashed his other hand apart. She aimed each blow carefully, taking her time, both eyes on the details. Fingertips. Fingers. Knuckles. Thumb. Palm. Wrist.

“Six and six,” grunted Friendly, over Gobba’s roars of pain.

The blood was surging in Monza’s ears. She wasn’t sure she’d heard him right. “Eh?”

“Six times, and six times.” He let go of Orso’s bodyguard and stood, brushing his palms together. “With the hammer.”

“And?” she snapped at him, no clue how that mattered.

Gobba was bent over the anvil, legs braced, dragging on the manacles and spraying spit as he tried vainly to shift the great thing with all his strength, blackened hands flopping.

She leaned towards him. “Did I tell you to get up?” The hammer split his kneecap with a sharp bang. He crumpled onto the floor on his back, was dragging in the air to scream when the hammer crunched into his leg again and snapped it back the wrong way.

“Hard work, this.” She winced at a twinge in her shoulder as she dragged her coat off. “But then I’m not as limber as I was.” She rolled her black shirtsleeve up past the long scar on her forearm. “You always did tell me you knew how to make a woman sweat, eh, Gobba? And to think I laughed at you.” She wiped her face on the back of her arm. “Shows you what I know. Unhook him.”

“You sure?” asked Friendly.

“Worried he’ll bite your ankles? Let’s make a chase of it.” The convict shrugged, then leaned down to unlock the cuffs around Gobba’s wrists. Shivers was frowning at her from the darkness. “Something wrong?” she snapped at him.

He stayed silent.

Gobba dragged himself to nowhere through the dirty sawdust with his elbows, broken leg slithering along behind. He made a kind of mindless groan while he did it. Something like the ones she’d made when she lay broken at the foot of the mountain beneath Fontezarmo.