Chapters (60)
- DAW Books Presents
- HAPPY HOURINHELL
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Dedication
- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
- prologue
- one
- two
- three
- four
- five
- six
- interlude
- seven
- eight
- nine
- ten
- eleven
- twelve
- interlude
- thirteen
- fourteen
- interlude
- fifteen
- sixteen
- seventeen
- eighteen
- nineteen
- twenty
- twenty-one
- interlude
- twenty-two
- twenty-three
- twenty-four
- twenty-five
- twenty-six
- twenty-seven
- twenty-eight
- twenty-nine
- thirty
- thirty-one
- thirty-two
- thirty-three
- thirty-four
- thirty-five
- thirty-six
- thirty-seven
- thirty-eight
- thirty-nine
- forty
- forty-one
- forty-two
- forty-three
- forty-four
- forty-five
- forty-six
- forty-seven
- forty-eight
- epilogue
His dark eyes went even wider. He was astonished by my ignorance. “The minder, he is, the big hand, big man. Around Squitters Row, anywise. He’ll come after, I’m not back to the works by afters.” Something about the way he spoke made me even more certain he was a child. His eyes kept darting to either side, and although he’d quit fighting, his muscles were still tense in my grip. If he couldn’t convince me to let go of him, this kid was going to do something to get free, probably something violent, but he was going to try to talk his way out first. I liked that. “What’s your name?” I asked.
He slitted his eyes as if I’d blazed a flashlight in his face. “Don’t got one.”
“What do you do? Where do you live? Do you have a family?”
The eyes crept wider still at this, as though he was having trouble keeping command of himself in the face of such bizarre questions. “Don’t got one. Live at the works.” He licked his lips, then asked nervously, “You Murder?” He saw I didn’t understand. “Murder Seck?”
It finally dawned on me that he was talking about the Murderers Sect, armed demon guards who functioned like mercenary soldiers. In the more built-up areas they were pretty much Hell’s police.
“No. Not me,” I said. “Not Murder Sect, just . . . ordinary.”
He tried something new. “Let me loose. Gotcher rock back, yeah? And I bite.” He showed me his grin, which was indeed made up of surprisingly clean, even, pointy little teeth, like you might see in a fish or a frog.
But I wasn’t letting him off that easily. “I need someone to help me find my way out of here.” It was a risk to trust anyone, even a child, but I’d run out of other ideas. “I’m lost.”
The little monkey-boy considered. Although I could see he was genuinely thinking about it, I could tell he wasn’t ready to give up on just running for it, either.
If you learn to hide your tells better, I decided, you’re going to be good, kid. But then I thought Here? and Compared to what? and the whole idea suddenly just made me really sad.
“Three spits,” he said at last.
Once he started to bargain I knew I had him. We settled on a deal where I’d feed him while he was with me and give him an iron spit at the end, when I found my way out of this level of Abaddon. I didn’t have a spit, of course, but I’d find a way to change that somehow.
“This way,” he said, and headed off without looking to see whether I was following.