I smuggled my prisoners into the city and hid them in a warehouse near the river, a Company friendly Shadar fish place possessed of a very distinctive air. My men scattered to their families or someplace where they could drink beer. I was satisfied. With one quick, nasty stab we had decimated the surviving Deceiver leadership. We almost got that fiend Narayan Singh. I got within spitting distance of Croaker’s baby. In all honesty I could report that she seemed all right.

Thai Dei knocked the prisoners to their knees, wrinkled his nose.

“You’re right,” I agreed. “But this place don’t stink half as bad as your swamp does.” Taglios claims the river delta but the Nyueng Bao disagree.

Thai Dei grunted. He could take a joke as well as the next guy.

He does not look like much. He is a foot shorter than I am. I outweigh him by eighty pounds. And I am far prettier. He has crudely cropped black hair that sticks out in unkempt spikes. Skinny, lantern-jawed, taciturn and surly, Thai Dei is entirely unappetizing. But he does his job.

A Shadar fishmonger brought the Captain to us. Croaker was getting old. We were going to have to call him Boss or Chief or something. You cannot call the Captain the Old Man once he’s really old, can you?

He was dressed like a Shadar cavalryman, all turban, beard and plain grey clothing. He eyed Thai Dei coolly. He did not have a Nyueng Bao bodyguard himself. He loathed the idea despite his having to disguise himself whenever he wanted to walk the streets alone. Bodyguards are not traditional. Croaker is stubborn about Company traditions.

Hell, the Shadowmaster’s officers all employ bodyguards. Some have several. They could not survive without them.

Thai Dei reflected Croaker’s gaze impassively, unimpressed by the presence of the great dictator. He might say, “He is one man. I am one man. We begin even.”

Croaker examined my prizes. “Tell it.”

I told it. “But I missed Narayan. I was this close. That bastard has a guardian angel. There’s no way he should have slipped Goblin’s sleep spell. We chased him for two days but even Goblin and One-Eye couldn’t hang onto his track forever.”

“He had help. Maybe from his guardian demon. Maybe from his new buddy the Shadowmaster, too.”

“How come they went back to the grove? How did you know they would be there?”

I thought he would say a big black bird told him.

They are less numerous these days but the crows still follow him everywhere. He talks to them. Sometimes they talk to him, too. So he says.

“They had to come someday, Murgen. They are slaves to their religion.”

But why this particular Festival of Lights? How did you know?

I did not press. You don’t press Croaker. He has grown cranky and secretive in his old age. In his own Annals he did not always tell the whole truth about personal things, his age especially.