Werth’s about to say something, but Candlefly turns on the light.

Revealed: the wine cellar. Oaken racks of dark bottles. In the back, a few cases of beer – good beer, not the cheap shit Werth likes to drink.

But none of that is as interesting as the man strapped to the chair in the middle of the floor. Werth knows him. How could he not? Mr Smiley’s one of the biggest information brokers in the city.

He’s a Snakeface. Doesn’t look the part right now because Werth is standing here Blind. Now Smiley’s just a man in a bright blue suit. Nice wing-tips. Manicured nails. And despite bring trussed up like a roast, he’s grinning big and broad.

“Is all of this… truly necessary?” Smiley asks. The smile is strained. Lips trembling to hold their position. Werth can see that. The grin is big, but the eyes are dark. Suspicious. People tend to smile with their whole face, but this, this is just lips turning upward.

“You know him, yes?” Candlefly asks.

Werth nods. “Hey, Smiley. Surprised to see you here.”

“Werth! My old satyr friend. Will you get me out of this chair?” Werth sees he’s bound up with zip-ties. A lot of them. Ankles and wrists, and then every two inches up the length. Too much for a man. Maybe not enough for a Snakeface. Especially one as slippery as Smiley. “It is dreadfully uncomfortable.”

He’s about to ask Candlefly what the deal is, but Candlefly’s already talking.

“Smiley came to us. He had information we thought valuable. He’s the one who told us that Mookie Pearl has a daughter, and that daughter is an enemy to our organization.”

Smiley nods as much as the zip-tie around his throat and the belt around his forehead allow. “And your hulking associate made a dire mess of my teahouse. Not to mention cracking open the skull of my bodyguard.”

Gorth? Mookie must have been pissed.

Smiley continues: “He didn’t want that information about him and the girl let out. So I knew the first thing I had to do was come here and…” The smile broadens, tightens. “Share.”

“At what cost?” Werth asks.

“Oh, come now. I don’t know what you mean!”

“You know just what the hell I mean. You didn’t offer up this information out of the good of your heart.” Werth looks to Candlefly. “He didn’t, did he?”

A gentle shake of Candlefly’s head. “No.”

“What’d he want?”

“He had a laundry list of desires. A waive of protection fees for the next year, information on his enemies, a talk with the Lantern Jacks – who have been encroaching on his business in the last few months.”

“Pumpkin-headed savages,” Smiley says.

Candlefly lifts the back of his coat. From a back pocket, he pulls a small square box with a silver seal on it: a burning fly inside an old lantern.