'Very well.' No delicate way to say it. I doubt that delicacy will serve us here in any case. 'It has come to my attention, your Majesty, that you have not been performing your duties as a wife.'

Terez' long, thin neck seemed to stretch with indignation. 'How dare you? That is none of your concern!'

'I am afraid that it is. Heirs for the king, you see. The future of the state, and so forth.'

'This is insufferable!' The queen's face was white with fury. The Jewel of Talins flashes fire indeed. 'I must eat your repulsive food, I must tolerate your dreadful weather, I must smile at the rambling mutterings of your idiot king! Now I must answer to his grotesque underlings? I am kept prisoner here!'

Glokta looked round at the beautiful room. The opulent hangings, the gilt furnishings, the fine paintings. The two beautiful women in their beautiful clothes. He dug one tooth sourly into the underside of his tongue. 'Believe me. This is not what a prison looks like.'

'There are many kinds of prison!'

'I have learned to live with worse, and so have others.' You should see what my wife has to put up with.

'To share my bed with some disgusting bastard, some scarred son of who knows what, to have some stinking, hairy man pawing at me in the night!' The queen gave a shiver of revulsion. 'It is not to be borne!'

Tears shone in her eyes. Her lady-in-waiting rushed forward, dress rustling, and knelt beside her, putting a comforting hand on her shoulder. Terez reached up, pressed her own hand on top of it. The queen's companion stared at Glokta with naked hatred. 'Get out! Out, cripple, and never come back! You have upset her Majesty!'

'I have a gift for it,' muttered Glokta. 'One reason why I am so widely hated…' He trailed off, frowning. He stared at their two hands on Terez' shoulder. There was something in that touch. Comforting, soothing, protective. The touch of the committed friend, the trusted confidante, the sisterly companion. But there is more than that. Too familiar. Too warm. Almost like the touch of… Ah.

'You don't have much use for men, do you?'

The two women looked up at him together, then Shalere snatched her hand away from the queen's shoulder. 'I will have your meaning!' barked Terez, but her voice was shrill, almost panicked.

'I think you know my meaning well enough.' And my task is made a great deal easier. 'Some help here!' Two hulking Practicals barged through the doors. And as quickly as that, everything is changed. Amazing, the spice that two big men can add to a conversation. Some kinds of power are only tricks of the mind. I learned that well, in the Emperor's prisons, and my new master has only reinforced the lesson.