“I saw someone, when I was…escaping,” she threw in. She hadn’t explained what transformations had been involved in her protracted escape. She was waiting for Khan to broach the impossible first. “Like a big woman in a robe, very broad. And before, there was this guy with Mal, looked like some street-corner preacher into extreme weightlifting. Scary-looking.”

“I’ve not met anyone like that,” Khan said thoughtfully. “Didn’t even see who brought you in. I got a call to warn me you were on your way, and then I came out of the loo later and you were just…there. I was shown a picture of a couple of them, before, though. One girl and her Ogg. The girl, I’d met. Supposed to be the same people who were at my flat, defending my honour from the fascists.”

“The…?”

“When you were there, after the break-in, I’d just had visitors. A pack of small-minded little shits were going to…punish me, for being me, you know.” She rattled the empty cigarette packet on the room’s little desk. “I locked myself in the loo, darling. Determined to sell my honour dearly, you know. But someone else got in ahead of them and…made quite a mess. You saw the bodies brought out, and they didn’t just all feel faint at the same time. I’ve…never seen anything like it. My flat was trashed.” She shuddered. “And you were looking for your Mal, and your Mal was in fact there, with this weird friend of hers. You’d recognize them from that photo they showed me, wouldn’t you?”

Lee thought about Mal’s new friend, the ogre, with fresh stains on his coat. She nodded mutely. “So what happened?”

“Oh, some old friends of mine, former employers actually, took an interest,” Khan said airily. “Put me up, made sure nobody else was coming to get me. They suspected your friend—and her friend—were trying to grab me as well, and the fascists had been competition. Not that you ever really need an excuse to slap a fascist.”

“They thought Mal wanted to kidnap you?”

“They’re suspicious sorts. Also, I’d been approached by this girl who was probably your friend, wanting me to go work for her friends, and my former employers are possessive.” Her face split in a grin at Lee’s baffled expression, and in a terrible stage whisper she added, “I was a spy.”

“What?”

“Well, not a spy as such. This is all Official Secrets Act territory, but I think we’re a bit beyond that now. I used to do very hard sums for the government. Hard enough sums that they don’t really want me checking anyone else’s working. So, yes, not the first time someone got in touch, actually, but…”

“But they got in touch and then there was no trace that they had?” Lee asked.