“Seriously, vermin, you think we just make that stuff out of squeezed chucklefuck berries or something? To work the way you wanted, you need actual magic, Dark magic. And it’s keyed to work against the Light in humanity. Mostly because I didn’t trust you not to serve it to me eventually, because you’re just that sort of treacherous slime. But this fine fellow here, he’s Dark as Dark, isn’t he? I mean, what is he, even? There’s all sorts of magic, here. And… You have a name, my friend?”

“Nth.” It was the same mangled sound that Cyrene had first heard, the spider trying to transliterate his native appellation into human speech.

“And you’re with her, are you? You’re, what, eloping? How sweet.”

Enth just stared. It was oddly reassuring to see that his sullen, silent treatment was not just reserved for servants of the Light.

“This is weird. Something funny’s going on. Hey, friend, you want to be here with her, do you? You’re a pal of hers?”

Enth shook his head wordlessly.

“You brought her here, maybe. Bit of rapine in the world’s least salubrious guesthouse? You like her, eh?”

Another shake. Cyrene, still utterly locked in place, had the sense that the man-spider didn’t understand much that was being said.

Feyn frowned and called up his magic eye again. “Ah,” he noted. “There’s something binding you, isn’t there, my friend? You’re compelled. Why would a servant of the Light be trolling around with a creature of the Dark on a leash?”

“Ask her, ask her, yes, yes,” suggested Visler.

Feyn rounded on him. “Well, I would, you moronic twat, only your poor sensitive stomach can’t take all the screaming and shrieking when you carve them up alive, so you wanted the poison to shut them up as well as paralyze them. So until it wears off, he’s the only one doing the talking.” His shoulders sagged. “I swear, I am going with barbarian warlords next time. You are the worst decision I ever made in my life.” Feyn took a deep breath. “Anyway,” he said pleasantly to Enth, “you can tell us, can’t you?”

For a moment there was only more silence from that direction, but then Enth gave a shuddering sigh, perhaps finding that the laws placed on him did not prevent a frank confession. “They took me. They changed me. They bound me.” There was a misery in his voice that cut. Cyrene found the raw sincerity there surprising: perhaps it was that she had no choice but to sit and listen to it.

Feyn was grinning. “Yeah, they’re mean like that. But you could come home with me, couldn’t you? You could come and meet Uncle Dark Lord Darvezian. He’d be all over you. He loves new toys. We’d get you some neat robes like mine. You like that?”