A flash of a smile lit Rennic’s battered face. ‘Now that I want to live to s—’

The rail behind him cracked and split, and a chunk of tower-top fell away, Rennic along with it. Rennic plunged from view, Chel’s lunging hands slapping from his body as he fell. Chel hit the cracked stone, arms outstretched, slick hands clasped on something. Plunging mass dragged him forward until he rocked against the rail that remained. His shoulder began to scream.

Rennic hung suspended from the broken tower, dangling free from Chel’s agonized grip on his arm. Far below, the silver waters of the Roni rippled and churned in the downpour. Rennic swung in space, feet loose and sodden. He looked up at Chel through bloodshot eyes and grinned pink against the rain.

‘Really half-arsed that restoration, didn’t they?’

Chel could only grunt. The fibres of his muscles were tearing like so much old meat, and his shoulder grated in its socket. ‘Climb. Swing. Something.’ Rennic’s weight was pulling him against the crumbling wall, and the cracks were spreading. Another chunk of ancient stone fell away beneath his shaking arms.

‘You never give up, do you?’ Rennic said. ‘You daft bastard.’

‘Hurry! Climb!’ Another crack ripped along the wall by Chel’s head, small stones pattering down the side of the tower, lost in the foaming waters below.

‘Let me go, boy. I’ll make my own way down. Nobody need know I was here.’

Chel’s grip was iron, his arms and shoulders afire.

‘No! Climb! Tell king, Spider dead—’

‘I’m not going to be a king’s pet.’

‘Nor me! Service ended.’

‘Then what are you doing here?’

‘Fighting.’

The wall by Chel’s shoulder began to disintegrate, cracks streaking like forks of lightning across it, flakes drifting free.

‘Let me go, you dunce, your arm will go. I can make the window on the lower floor, dodge all those keen lads in livery.’

‘No!’ He was hoarse from screaming, his tears mingling with the flowing rain. ‘Come back with me, stay—’

Rennic’s voice was quiet in the heart of the storm.

‘You were supposed to be lucky, little man.’ He closed his eyes, letting the rain flow over him. ‘Maybe you were.’

Rennic took a long, slow breath, as the rain ran down his face like tears.

‘Be seeing you.’

Before Chel could shout a reply, Rennic put one hand over his, braced a leg against the smooth stone of the tower, and twisted. His spin wrenched Chel’s arm from its socket, sending a white-hot burst of pain along his arm. He was momentarily blind, screaming at the sudden agony, good hand clutching at the trauma.

It took him several breaths to realize that his hands were empty. Rennic was gone. Bleary-eyed, Chel peered over the broken edge, but below lay nothing but the swirling ebony water of the Roni. And an open window, one floor down.

‘Oh, you spiteful fucker.’