Time passed. If I’d had even a skerrick of faith in gods of one persuasion or another, I’d have prayed to them to make a lie of Slammer’s words, or if that wasn’t possible, at least to give someone else the chance to do what death would prevent me from doing. Never mind my own so-called crime and the need to prove my innocence. Mathuin must be brought to account. He must be stopped. He must be made to pay.

But I did not believe in gods, not anymore, and there was nobody else. When I died, my vengeance would die with me. There was no justice in the world.

Maybe I could use the rusty nail to slit my wrists. Better to make an end of myself than let Slammer or one of the others butcher me like a pig for the table. More dignity in it this way. But no; I’d blunted the nail with my wild scratching, and it wouldn’t even break the skin. I contemplated sticking it in my eye. But that wouldn’t be final enough, and I doubted I had the resolve anyway. I could smash my head against the bars, harder than before, but I’d probably only knock myself senseless and come to just in time for that little knife Slammer had mentioned. Hanging was too slow. By the time I’d ripped up my skirt and made a noose, then managed to tie it high enough, Grim would have made enough racket to fetch whichever guard was sleeping outside the door down the end. Which made no sense, when you thought about it; rush in to stop a person killing herself, so you could do the job for her in a scant – what – six hours or so?

‘How long till dawn, do you think?’ I murmured.

‘A while yet.’ Grim’s voice was held quiet, too, so as not to wake the others. In this place, good sleep was a gift not to be taken lightly. He muttered something else.

‘What?’

‘I’d go in your place, if I could.’

I hadn’t thought the big man had it in him to surprise me, but I’d been wrong. ‘That’s just stupid,’ I said. ‘Of course you wouldn’t. All men are liars, and you’re no better than the rest of them.’

A silence, then. After a while he said, ‘I would, Lady. The way I see it, your life’s worth something. Mine’ll never amount to much.’