“I… of course, Captain,” Brettin said. “Have… er, we met?”

Wayne blew out his mustaches. “We sat at the same table at the chairman’s dinner last spring!” He was feeling pretty good about this accent. It was a mixture of seventh-son lord and foreman of an ironworks, with just a hint of canal captain. Speaking with it felt like he’d stuffed cotton in half of his mouth and had borrowed the voice from an angry dog.

But he’d spent weeks in the city now, listening in pubs in different octants, visiting the railway tracks, chatting with people in parks. He’d collected a good number of accents, adding them to the ones he’d already stolen. Even when living in Weathering, he’d taken trips to the city to gather accents. You found the best ones here.

“I… oh, of course,” Brettin said. “Yes. Trenchant, I recognize you now. It has been a while.”

“Never mind that,” Wayne blustered. “What’s this about you having prisoners from the Vanishers Gang? Good steel, man! We had to learn about it from the broadsheets!”

“We have jurisdiction here, as the event—” Brettin hesitated, looking at the room full of intrigued constables studiously pretending not to be listening. “Step inside.”

Wayne eyed the watching men. Not a one of them had questioned him. Act like you were important, act like you were angry, and people just wanted to get out of your way. Basic psychology, that was. “Very well,” he said.

Brettin closed the door, speaking quickly and authoritatively. “They were captured in our octant and the crime they were committing was here. We have jurisdiction flat-out. I did send you all a missive.”

“A missive? Rust and Ruin, man! You know how many of those we get a day?”

“Well perhaps you should hire someone to sort through them,” Brettin said testily. “That’s what I eventually did.”

Wayne blew out his mustache. “Well, you could have sent someone over to inform us,” he said lamely.

“Next time, perhaps,” Brettin said, sounding satisfied for having won the argument and disarmed an angry rival. “We are rather busy with those prisoners.”

“Well and good,” Wayne said. “When are you sending them to us?”

“What?” Brettin said.

“We have prior claim! You have jurisdiction for the initial inquest, but we have prosecution rights. First robbery happened in our octant.” Wax had written that out for him. Bloke could be right useful, on occasion.

“You have to give us a written request for that!”

“We sent a missive,” Wayne said.

Brettin hesitated.

“Earlier today,” Wayne said. “You didn’t get it?”

“Er… We get a lot of missives…”

“Thought you said you hired someone to read them.”

“Sent him out for scones earlier, you see…”

“Ah. Well then.” Wayne hesitated. “Can I have one?”

“Of the scones or the prisoners?”

Wayne leaned in. “Look, Brettin, let’s melt this down and forge it. We both know you can stall for months with those prisoners while we complete proper transfer paperwork. That is basically worthless to both of us. You get a lot of hassle, and we lose any chance we had of catching the rest of these fellows. We need to move quick.”