I said nothing. Apparently he hadn't been told yet that I'd hooked up with Madman, Sinner, and Pretty Poison. So let him think I'd killed the Reasonable Men. It all helped maintain my reputation.

"Never did take to Hadleigh," Walker admitted, spearing a piece of meat with his fork. "Dreadful fellow. Far too full of himself; downright cocky, in fact."

"Not quite the word I had in mind for him, but close," I said. "Will there be repercussions?"

"For killing thirteen bright young men with prospects, all from good families? Oh, almost certainly. I don't give a damn, but you can be sure the families, some of them very old and very connected, will be most upset with you. This time tomorrow there won't be a bounty hunter in the Nightside without paper on you. The price on your head is about to go through the roof. And don't look to me to protect you. They were my boys, after all."

"Let them all come," I said. "I've never depended on you for protection."

He nodded slightly, admitting the point. "This new case of yours, Taylor..."

"Yes."

"Drop it."

I leaned back in my chair, studying him thoughtfully. Walker isn't usually that direct. "Why?"

"Because the Authorities don't take kindly to anyone investigating the Nightside's history and beginnings."

"Why not?"

Walker sighed, as though faced with a very dim pupil. "Because it is possible that you might discover things better left lost and forgotten, things that might threaten or even upset the status quo. If only because an awful lot of people, and I use the term loosely, would be very interested in obtaining such information. And would almost certainly make every effort to buy, steal, or torture it from you. We are talking about the kind of people even you would have trouble saying no to. They might even go to war with each other over its possession, and we can't have that. We're still recovering and rebuilding after the recent angel war— a war you helped to bring about. The Authorities would quite certainly order me to have you eliminated, rather than risk another war in the Nightside."

"And you'd hate to have to do that," I said.

"Of course," said Walker. "There's still a lot of use I was hoping to get out of you, before your inevitable early death."

"You'd really have me killed, after all the jobs I've done for you? After all the messes I've cleaned up for you? After I saved the whole Nightside by bringing the angel war to a close?"

"Only after you started it."

"Details, details."

Walker looked at me narrowly. "There is a line you can't be allowed to cross, Taylor. A line no-one can be allowed to cross. For the good of all. So; who hired you?"

It was my turn to raise an eyebrow. "I thought you knew everything, Walker?"

"Normally, I do. Whoever hired you must be incredibly powerful, to hide their identity from my people, and that in itself is worrying."