I could only think of one reason for them to take us out of sight. Stone-cold dead on my first assignment. Would Hector actually kill me for implying he was wrong? I could imagine the gravestone: Paige Eva Mahoney, died because she implied that a greasy-haired criminal was wrong. Nicklas Alvar Nygård, died because he had the misfortune to be with her.

They herded us into the seamy alleyway, which stank of urine. Someone closed the gate. We were surrounded.

Hector turned to me, still wearing that placid smile. There was something underneath it that made me even more uneasy than before – a sort of avarice. It was the look of a man who had seen something he wanted, and whose thirst for it would not be easily slaked.

‘Pale Dreamer, I feel that as Underlord, I should welcome you personally into the syndicate.’ He snapped his fingers. ‘Underhand, Bloatface. Greet the young lady.’

‘No.’ Nick put himself in front of me. ‘Don’t. Don’t, Hector.’

Two members of Hector’s group pared away from the rest. A powder-white, bald man who looked as if someone had squashed him together from modelling clay, and a taller one who was swollen with muscle. Each of his hands were larger than both of mine put together.

‘She’s sixteen,’ Nick said, quieter. ‘She’s new to the syndicate.’ When this failed to soften any faces, he tried a different tack. ‘Binder won’t be happy if she’s hurt.’

My heartbeat had thickened. It drummed in my ears and the hollow of my throat. Stupid, stupid thing to do. Their looks were bloodthirsty – they meant business. And there was a fine line between using my voice and throwing myself headfirst into danger.

‘I’m quite sure Binder will find it in his heart to forgive me,’ Hector said. ‘We’re such good friends, he and I. All I want is for the Pale Dreamer to understand where she belongs. It’s a lesson all of you have learned, one way or another. Blood now, or blood later, it’s all the same.’

Something gleamed in Nick’s hand, and then he was pointing a knife at them. Its blade caught the blue glow from a streetlamp.

‘Don’t be a fool, boy,’ Hector said very softly.

‘Nick, no,’ I hissed.

Sweat beaded along my nape. I couldn’t let him get beaten or killed for me.

‘I ask your forgiveness,’ I said to Hector, swallowing my pride. ‘I’m sorry. I’m … not used to the ways of the syndicate.’

‘Which is why we are here, Pale Dreamer. To remedy your ignorance,’ Hector said, almost gently. ‘To teach you the rules.’

He nodded to the larger of the two men. A fist sailed, hitting Nick straight in the jaw.