He reached the top, with barely enough strength to fall through the door and lie on the gravel path. The door swung shut behind him; disguised by a bamboo screen, it blended into its surroundings so completely that when he next looked up, he couldn’t work out how he’d got there.

Stones stuck to his face, his hands, and he barely noticed apart from the rattle they made as they fell from him one by one.

Madeleine hadn’t reappeared, despite her assurance that she would. He’d almost turned back half a dozen times, only to imagine the tongue-lashing he’d get for not keeping his mind on the job.

So he’d kept on going and, now he was there, he was without her. Failure was written all over the venture. He couldn’t even stand.

He rolled over onto his back and let the light from the artificial sky shine down on him. The air was as warm as a bright spring day, yet he was cold, cold to the core.

Feet crunched down the path toward him. He heard a metallic snap, and a shadow covered him.

“Petrovitch?”

He squinted into the glare. “Konnichiwa, Hijo-san.”

“You… what are you doing here?” Hijo pointed his gun at Petrovitch’s heaving chest.

“I’ve come for Sonja. I just didn’t know it was you who had her. What did you do with Chain?”

“He will not be bothering us again.” Hijo took a couple of steadying breaths and sighted down his arm. “Neither will you, Petrovitch. You are still that loose thread.”

“Yeah, not so much anymore. I’m the thread that’s holding everything together. Pull it and the whole sorry garment falls apart, leaving you naked.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning that come dawn, there’ll be two suns in the sky.” Petrovitch let the cultural resonance of that phrase sink in, then added. “You killed your boss because you wanted for free everything he’d built up the hard way. You wanted to be the big man, the—what is it?—taishou. And everything you’ve done since then has just made it worse. Now you have nothing and in the morning you’ll have even that taken away.”

“A filthy Russian street-dog does not have the authority to call down a nuclear strike.” Hijo ground his teeth and his hand shook. “You are bluffing.”