‘Embarrassed? You will not die of embarrassment.’ Stanislav kicked Dalip’s boilersuit further away. ‘No. You cannot run away in here. Against animals, predators who will be used to killing for food and for dominance, there can be no running. You must dodge, close and strike, use your mind as a weapon as much as a knife. The longer a fight goes on, the more likely you are to lose. When you are tired, you will make mistakes. Out there, you have the chance to do it again. In here, it will kill you.’

Despite the cold, Dalip found his hands damp with sweat. Of course he was nervous. He’d be a fool not to be.

‘So how do we start?’

Stanislav weighed up the options. ‘You know what this is?’

He dropped to the ground and balanced his straight body on his fingers and toes. His elbows bent, his body dipped, then he straightened them again.

‘A press up,’ said Dalip.

‘You need more strength in your back and shoulders. Your arms are like sticks. One hundred. Start now, and I will find some weapons to practise with.’

Dalip assumed the position. He was quite light, and the first twenty weren’t too difficult. He could hear voices off, away down the corridor. He raised his head enough to see Stanislav and Pigface engage in, at first, an animated conversation with a lot of gesturing, and then it escalated to a full-throated shouting match. Pigface turned to walk away: a brief struggle ensued, ending up with the guard’s head squashed against the stone wall by Stanislav’s meaty hand, while the other relieved him of his knife. It had happened so quickly, almost effortlessly, that Dalip had no idea of the order of events.

Pigface slid down the wall when released, and Stanislav re-entered the pit. He stooped to put the knife on the floor and acted as if nothing had happened.

‘How many have you done?’

‘Twenty-six.’

Pigface was picking himself up off the ground, pressing his palm to the side of his head, staring narrow-eyed at Stanislav.

‘More, then,’ said Stanislav. ‘And faster. This is not meant to be easy. While you are doing that, tell me what you saw outside: tell me about the buildings, how far away they are, how many soldiers you saw.’

He gave the details as best he could, and then talked about what he presumed was the geomancer’s stronghold.

‘There’s a tower attached to this one, by a bridge that links the first floors. If that’s where she lives, then she can just walk from there to here without going down to the ground. But the only way out of here for us is through the guard room.’

‘How high is that balcony? Three and a half metres? Four? If one of us could climb that, then there is another way out.’