Mucum’s voice shook. “If these slimy creatures are opening up shop, it might be ‘cos they’re thirsty!”

“I don’t understand.” Ark’s legs and arms throbbed with the effort of the climb. What was Mucum on about? But then the ladder began to vibrate and understanding slammed into Ark’s brain. “Oh …,” he whimpered.

“We’re in the squit!” Mucum screeched.

They both clung to the thin rungs of the ladder. Not that it would make any difference.

The tide was on the turn and two insignificant sewage workers were perched directly in its path.

15• BRIBERY OR EXECUTION

“Isn’t it past your bedtime?” Petronio couldn’t resist crowing. He licked off the cold, midnight dew that had formed on his upper lip and wiped his face with his sleeve as Mercury ambled along.

Flinty ignored him as his boys led horse and rider down the rubbish-strewn woodway. The gang’s black clothes merged into the fog, turning them into floating wraiths.

After half an hour, Petronio sensed a series of shapes behind the trees on his right, blurred by the fog. Lamps set into the interspersed trunks and regular posts along the woodway showed a set of low, squat buildings with blacked-out rectangles for windows, their straight edges in strict contrast to the curves of branch and leaf. As the gang moved on, Petronio saw that this settlement dwarfed the Court of King Quercus. Fenestra was right. This mission could be the turning point.

They skirted the edges of the barracks for a further twenty minutes before finally pulling up near a corner trunk. The walkway between acted as a drawbridge, currently open, the ropes on either side slack. The double doors beyond were sheathed in iron and shut fast. Embossed into the archway was a figure of a brown, overmuscled bear with its huge jaws clamped around a dying wild dog. They had finally arrived at their destination: the armories of Moss-side.

The stallion was nervous, his hooves skittering on the wood as Petronio pulled gently on the reins.

Suddenly, the hollow slits on either side of the doors were filled with pointing arrows.

A voice boomed into the darkness, “Who goes?”

Flinty was having none of it. Despite carrying no shield, he marched straight across the drawbridge and up to the right-hand slit, until the arrowheads were virtually resting against his chest. “Who goes? Who buddy goes? I do, mate!”

The voice from behind the slit faltered, but only momentarily. “What business do you have before I put more prickles in you than a hedgehog!”

“Look at my face!” Flinty ordered, without a hint of fear. “Recognize the family resemblance, by any chance?”